


Am I a Hero or a Bloody Damsel in Distress?

by Canadiantardis



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter/Funhaus RPF, X-Ray & Vav (Cartoon)
Genre: Actually might be kinda graphic I might have lied, Angst, Blood, Character Death, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, I'm Sorry, Interrogation, Kidnapping, M/M, Nightmares, Nothing really graphic though, Polyamory, Torture, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-13
Updated: 2016-08-12
Packaged: 2018-06-08 03:42:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 21
Words: 28,816
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6837748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Canadiantardis/pseuds/Canadiantardis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Where is the blue suit?” He asked, his words clipped like always.<br/>X-Ray jumped to attention, spinning in a circle as he realized the bear man was right. Vav was nowhere to be seen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Little British Boy

Vav woke with a killer headache, his tongue tasting funny, like he had tried to drink the whole liquor cabinet again back at his and X-Ray’s place, but something in the back of his mind found it not exactly likely he had had any alcohol for the past couple days.

As he slowly became aware, still yet to open his eyes, Vav felt himself bump as his hearing came back at the moment to hear what seemed to be a loud engine of some sort of large car. His back soon told him he was lying uncomfortably on his arms on the floor of something that smelled like cigarette smoke and ash.

When Vav tried to open his eyes, he found himself to still be seeing blackness, figuring he was blindfolded with some rough cloth that prevented him from seeing anything, besides the tiniest bit of light from where his nose made the cloth bend.

So he couldn’t see and from the extra amount of digging into his back where his hands were, he guessed he was also tied up. It was then that Vav realized his hands were cool and clammy, which didn’t normally happen when he was wearing his Slow-Mo gloves.

_What the bloody hell happened?_ He wondered, before grunting in pain as a big bump jostled his entire body, whatever was already digging into his back stabbing him quickly enough for him to squirm.

“’Ey, look. Little British boy’s awake.” A slightly higher than low male voice gruffly sounded somewhere close to Vav’s head, to his left, and he felt a sausage-like digit prod just below his ribs, making him squirm again, if only to get away from the finger.

“That blindfold on tight, right?” Another gruff voice from Vav’s right asked and he felt his head being lifted and the blindfold tightened, pulling a few strands of hair as well that made him grunt.

Vav opened his mouth to speak before belatedly realizing it was taped shut, the tape pulling on his skin as he tried to get his mouth open. Now he was _really_ worried about what happened that landed him in this sort of situation. His memory was a little fuzzy.

He remembered fighting, of course. He was on duty with X-Ray and Mogar, who had recently joined the duo on patrols since the forest where he lived was actually normally peaceful. He remembered X-Ray and Mogar running off ahead to catch… Whoever they had managed to get to, when…

Vav’s head ached. He must have been hit with some sort of bat or something, stunning him enough to not let him call out for his friends and to not be able to fight as a cloth was placed over his mouth and nose, and the sickly sweet smell of chloroform made him limp in the arms of whoever had taken him.

“Yep.” The first gruff voice brought him back to the present as his head was released and he flopped it down on the floor of what he guessed was some sort of car. “Can’t see a bleeding thing, I s’pose.”

“Good.” The second said and Vav could imagine the villain had a villainous sneer on his villainous face. “Don’t want to spoil the surprise for him.”

The two chuckled, along with a couple other laughs, and Vav was surprised to hear a young girl’s laugh among them. He hadn’t met many girl bad guys since he and X-Ray became heroes for the city, and none of the women he had fought against certainly never sounded so… Girly.

“We nearly there, yeah?” The first man asked, and Vav turned his head slightly.

“Yeah, nearly there. Double check on his restraints.” The second man said. “Don’t take any chances on the twink.”

Vav felt himself being lifted up until he was sitting up, his head still a little fuzzy and heavy; apparently the chloroform hadn’t yet totally left his system and even behind a blindfold he felt his vision swim. His arms were pulled and the thin strip that tied his hands together, he guessed now they were zip-ties, were tightened almost painfully so, they were now biting into his wrists, and his face twisted into a grimace, the same soon happening with his legs until his knees knocked together uncomfortably. A couple laughed at his discomfort before Vav felt the car stop suddenly, his body tilting to the right and hitting the back of a seat, which caused more chuckles from around him before doors opened and Vav felt a very cool breeze pass over the bits of him that wasn’t covered with either his hero suit or the various restraints that left him helpless.

He felt movement around before large calloused hands grabbed his arms, pulling him out of the car and lifted up fireman style, his head whacking against the back of the person who held him only by his legs. Vav tried to struggle, tried to remember if Miss Hilda or someone else had possibly taught him and X-Ray how to escape, but absolutely nothing came to mind, and with the chloroform still in his system, although now leaving him, he could do nothing against those who had captured him.

XXX

X-Ray felt something wasn’t right as he and Mogar finished the last of the baddies. They were just about to start tying them all together so they wouldn’t escape before the police came to take them away when the feeling in his stomach grew.

Looking around, he couldn’t see anything wrong. Mogar was putting zip-ties on the first few baddies, all of them completely KOed from the combined strength of X-Ray and Mogar. The alleyway they had been fighting in was still a shady place, dirty and smelling like garbage. Nothing strange about that, but what was causing X-Ray to feel uneasy.

Mogar seemed to sense the same thing, his head snapping up suddenly as he finished tying up the last guy, eyes narrowed to slits as X-Ray saw him search quickly around. But apparently, unlike X-Ray, Mogar realized what was missing quickly.

“Where is the blue suit?” He asked, his words clipped like always.

X-Ray jumped to attention, spinning in a circle as he realized the bear man was right. Vav was nowhere to be seen.

“He was just behind us, like, a minute ago, right?” He asked Mogar, who shrugged, eyes still narrowed suspiciously. “Fuck…” He muttered before cupping his hands over his mouth like a megaphone. “VAV!”

The two waited a couple breathless moments but got no reply. The feeling returned and X-Ray tried to not look as worried as he was, and he even saw Mogar’s eyes look concerned, when he had them opened wider than a squint.

“Blue suit!” Mogar shouted, his voice much louder than X-Ray’s without even needing to cup his hands, but still, no answer to the call.

Vav was gone.

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been sitting on this story for a bit of a while, and only just got about to writing it down.  
> So far I've written about 5 chapters and I know what I hope will happen, but if it will go completely the way I want it to go is another story altogether.  
> Also, a bit of a heads up, I plan on having some form of torture in this story, but have yet to decide what kind it will be and to what extent it will be shown. Give me a week and I should have that figured out.


	2. A Single Glove

X-Ray had been walking back the way they had approached the alleyway when he saw the familiar bright red of Vav’s gloves, but as he came closer, he only found one, carelessly thrown to the side by the mouth of the alleyway, just before it would have been in the middle of the sidewalk.

Walking quickly to it, X-Ray stooped to pick the single red glove up, holding it carefully. He heard Mogar approach behind him and before the bear man could open his mouth, X-Ray showed him the glove.

“It’s Vav’s. I can tell from a mile away it's his.”

“Why would they be off of blue suit?” Mogar asked, hand going for the glove and for a split second X-Ray had the absurd thought Mogar was going to destroy the only clue the two of them had of what might have happened to their British friend. He shook himself mentally and gave the glove to the warrior.

“Fuck if I know, dude.” X-Ray shrugged, trying to sound nonchalant but he could hear the slight tremor of worry lacing his tone. “Something must have happened. Vav would never take these off when he’s fighting.”

“Maybe the purple one might know?” Mogar suggested, handing the glove back to X-Ray as if it was fine china.

“Hilda? Yeah… Yeah! Hilda could totally find him!” X-Ray cried, hurriedly putting Vav’s glove in his over-undies and walking out of the alleyway quickly, heading for Hilda’s lab, Mogar following just behind him.

_Hilda could definitely find out where Vav went._ He thought as they practically sprinted to Hilda’s lab.

The two reached Hilda’s lab just as the sky turned as purple as Hilda’s hair, both knowing the scientist probably wouldn’t be leaving her labs until well after midnight on these kinds of nights. X-Ray buzzed to her and was quickly allowed in.

“What did you break this time?” The annoyed groan of the purple haired scientist came from deep in the labs.

“You have to help us find Vav!” X-Ray ignored the comment, digging through his over-undies for Vav’s glove, practically throwing the thing at the table Hilda was sitting at.

“What?” She asked, pushing up a ridiculous pair of magnifying goggles to look over at X-Ray and Mogar.

“Something happened to the blue suit during a battle.” Mogar tried to explain before X-Ray stepped in.

“We were fighting some lame-o baddies and when we’re finished, Vav’s nowhere to be seen. We found that by the entrance of the alleyway we fought in.” X-Ray pointed to the glove. “We don’t know where he went.”

“You sure he didn’t just need to take a piss or something?” Hilda asked, looking skeptical.

“Vav wouldn’t just leave one of his gloves in an alley, Hilda.” X-Ray had to keep himself from shouting as he argued with the woman.

“He did not answer Mogar’s call. Blue suit usually answers when Mogar calls.” Mogar put in, standing beside X-Ray, and Hilda must have seen something in how the two boys looked that her skepticism dissipated a bit.

“He was gone? How long ago was this?” She asked, taking the glove and examining it.

“Well, it was light when we started fighting. About an hour ago I think?” X-Ray guessed, looking at his watch before nodding. “Yeah, a little around an hour ago.”

Hilda hummed before giving a whistle. “Orf! I’m gunna need your help with something.”

The little sphere robot flew towards them from farther in the labs, the little face smiling artificially.

“What do you need assistance with, Hilda? Hello X-Ray and Mogar.” Orf greeted brightly before turning to Hilda.

“Can you see if you can find Vav’s suit tracker? Boy wonders 2 and 3 seemed to have lost him.” Hilda told the little robot.

Orf whirred before a red X appeared on the screen where Orf’s face was. “Negative. Vav’s suit is currently powered off. That or someone has tampered with the tracker.” The little robot said, still upbeat and happy as they spoke.

“What?” All three humans looked at the little floating sphere with varying degrees of emotions. X-Ray sounded incredulous with the smallest bit confused, not sure what Orf meant. Mogar was simply confused, the big words going over his head but he understood the gist of it, while Hilda started to sound worried. Her trackers were woven into the suits, and even if the material ripped during a fight or anything like that, the tracker would still work, not even water could short circuit it. If someone was tampering with her tracker.

“Who were you three fighting?” She asked, turning to the boys.

“Just some baddies. They didn’t look familiar.” X-Ray shook his head and saw Hilda sigh a little shakily.

“So that rules out Mad King. He uses all the same baddies.” She seemed to mumble to herself. “Orf, can you track to the last time Vav’s tracker was working?”

A green check mark appeared on Orf’s screen before the little robot spoke. “Affirmative. Forty-three minutes ago, Vav’s suit was in the following coordinates.” The screen lit up with a map view of the coordinates, a couple blocks away from where the fighting took place, in a different alleyway, before crackling. “Any time after, Vav’s suit had stopped working.”

“That’s just a dead end alleyway. Must have held a car or something.” Hilda said, a deep frown appearing on her face. “He could be anywhere now.”

“We can check that place, see if we can find anything.” X-Ray did not want to lose any sort of lead and if that lead was currently a dead end alleyway, he had to try to find something that would bring them closer to Vav.

“Not now. It’s too dark to look for proper clues. Crack of light, you can start.” Hilda said.

“Can’t I use these glasses?” He gestured wildly to the x-ray specs on his face but Hilda shook her head.

“They see through things, the night vision isn’t yet implemented. And before you demand.” She put a hand up to stop the question X-Ray was about to ask. “It would take even longer to implement the night vision than to wait for dawn. I’d have to strip everything down and add some new parts to the lenses and recalibrate and all that jazz. On top of that, I’m tired as hell, so getting the night vision would take even longer.”

“Mogar can search in darkness.” Mogar piped up, crossing his arms.

“No, Mogar can’t. You are part bear, not cat.” Hilda replied. “And you wouldn’t be able to tell what you would be looking for in terms of clues. Just…” She sighed. “Just wait with X-Ray for morning, so you both can start looking, okay?”

“But!” X-Ray started but the words fizzled. There wasn’t anything he could say that would help with actually searching during the night and visibly deflated.

Hilda gave a sympathetic look to him, before heading back farther into the labs with Orf at her heels, most likely heading for the small room the woman had to sleep when she wasn’t heading home after working.

X-Ray jumped when a hand roughly patted him on the shoulder, looking up to see Mogar looking at him, concerned.

“We will find blue suit. Tomorrow.” He said, squeezing X-Ray’s shoulder reassuringly and carefully. The bear man had a lot of strength that he couldn’t always control but since he had started fighting and just hanging out with him and Vav, Mogar had started giving light touches, careful to not hurt either man when they went to high five or fist bump on successful patrols.

X-Ray smiled, a small smile that didn’t completely reach his eyes, and patted the hand on his shoulder. “Yeah, tomorrow.”

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Orf isn't gendered, right? I know some people use she(think I've seen a couple use he), but I'm trying to not gender it.


	3. Cells

Vav tried to follow the path, but with the fog in his head only now leaving him and the strides of the person that held him jostling him enough to make him feel like his brain was going to turn into a smoothie made that plan impossible to follow. The only thing he knew was that he had been taken down some stairs, into a cold basement area before finally they reached a door. The door swung open and he was brought into the room, and was made to sit on what felt like a wooden rickety chair.

He had no time to react when he felt a hand take an edge of the tape that kept him quiet before it ripped painfully off, and he was so unprepared he cried out.

“Bloody hell!” He shouted, sucking in his lips as his cheeks and lips smarted from the pain.

The person who had ripped the tape off laughed before the blindfold was taken off, again pulling strands of hair from where the knot had been made and Vav was blinded by the sudden white light the room he was in had on.

Squinting, Vav looked around and saw nothing but white and dark grey everywhere. Grey walls, grey floor, metal gray table, and white light so bright it hurt.

In front of him stood a burly man with sunglasses covering most of his face, a sharp looking knife in his hand and Vav gulped. The man stooped down low and Vav heard something plastic snap and the tightness that held his ankles together disappeared. The man stood up and began walking away.

“Hey, wait! What about my hands?” Vav called, his voice a little scratchy. The man laughed, but didn’t respond and left the British superhero in what he could only guess was going to be his cell for the next while.

Vav sighed and looked around the cell, noting that along with the table he had seen before, there was a single small bed in one corner, the mattress in still good condition, not at all like the cots he would see in movies or what people would say a cell cot looked like. There were no major stains, and a single wool-looking kind of blanket that seemed like it would keep off a bit of the cold that was starting to get to Vav.

He jiggled his legs, hoping he wouldn’t get pins and needles if he stood up and after about a minute of making sure the blood was flowing properly in his legs, Vav stood up and took a couple steps around, stumbling as if he had walked in days. And who knew, that could be true, for all Vav knew. He didn’t believe he had been out of it for too long, but he could never be too sure.

There was a window just at Vav’s eye height if he stood on his toes that showed an unimpressive view of a brick building except on the very edge of the left, where Vav could just see what might have been a garden or something. He saw a lot of green and grass before he nearly lost his balance and dropped back to his feet with a reluctant sigh.

Besides that, there wasn’t much else in the cell that could interest the British hero. The door was unimpressive and even if his hands had been freed, Vav had a feeling he wouldn’t be able to escape. There was no handle on this side of the door, and it was made with what looked like the same material as the walls, just a lot more shiny.

Vav stumbled to the bed, sitting on it tiredly. He had no idea where he was, didn’t have any way to use his hands, didn’t seem to have his gloves (man, Miss Hilda will be right pissed when Vav was going to tell her that), and had no idea who had taken him, or even why for that matter.

With a tired sigh, Vav shifted until he could find a comfortable way to sleep on the bed, finding himself on his stomach and neck turned away from the small pillow so he could still breathe.

* * *

 

Vav woke to a loud voice shouting practically in his ear.

“Wake up!” The low voice reverberated all the way to Vav’s brain and he cried out, scrambling as well as he could away from the voice as he heard the low laughter.

With his brain scrambling to wake up, his eyes blinking owlishly, a rough hand grabbed his upper arm and pulled him off the bed.

“What the bloody hell was that all about?” Vav demanded, blinking hard in an attempt to get the sleep sand out of his eyes.

The laughter just continued as Vav was pulled almost backwards towards the now open door. He took a quick glance outside and saw it was still quite dark, not even a little bit of light of morning, before he was pulled away, out the door and now he tried to right himself, looking around the area he was in now.

It was a large room, about three times the size of his bedroom in X-Ray’s home, and several doors along the edges on each side, with a staircase on the far side of where Vav’s cell is.

He was marched to a room a little bit away from his cell, and the room looked very much like what he had heard about in movies and mysteries. A single white light swung from an unknown breeze in the middle of the room, where a hard looking wooden chair sat bolted to the floor, with leather straps where the wrists and ankles would go, and a bright blue, almost newly bought blue, tarp, sat around the chair, and finally, a trolley with a cover covering whatever might be on it lay just on the outside of the tarp.

Vav’s eyes went round and he was pulled towards the chair unwillingly, his body unsure what to do, and so basically locking up since the flight option wasn’t available at the moment.

He was forced to sit down and his legs were strapped to the front legs of the chair before the man who had woken him up snapped the zip-tie holding his hands behind his back. Before Vav could react to his hands being free, one of them was grabbed and quickly strapped down.

Only then, when his only free hand was about to be grabbed, was when Vav acted. He pulled his arm, as well as his body, as far as he could away from the man’s hand, and when the man leant forward to grab him, Vav quickly headbutted him, satisfied when he heard a crack and a yell from the man as he stumbled back. With the distraction, Vav scrambled to untie his other hand before the man returned, one hand wrapping itself tightly, oh god, so tightly around his throat and squeezed and oh god Vav’s eyes bugged out and he gagged, unable to draw breath. His free hand scrambled for some way to break free of the choking hold but he wasn’t strong, and with lack of air, he was quickly becoming weaker. His attempts weakened until he saw spots and his hand fell to the armrest, his heart hammering violently in his chest.

Finally the man let go of his throat in favour of finishing tying him down to the chair and Vav did nothing but gulp down blessed, beautiful air, despite the air tasting stale and dusty. He shook visibly. A lot has happened since he and X-Ray became superheroes and Vav thought he had been ready for anything, but the idea that he was so weak he couldn’t escape a chokehold filled the British man with fear.  He now knew he wasn’t as ready as he had thought he would be, and now thought he never would be ready for anything if he could even escape from wherever he was being held.

“Fuckin’ brat.” He heard the man who had choked him snarl as Vav caught his breath, his throat now feeling sore every time he took a deep breath.

Vav kept his head down as the man finished tying him up to the chair before he saw him step around him to the back of his chair.

They waited for who knew how long before Vav met the person who had captured him.

When he saw the person, his eyes almost bugged out again.

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Meeting the villain next chapter! Look forward to meeting the villain!


	4. Vipers

Walking in stiletto heels that looked very uncomfortable just to look at, was a very slim woman in a form fitting dark red dress, the colour reminding Vav of a fire with the shading made on the dress. The woman looked buff as hell, her dark arms with more muscles than Mogar it looked like. She had long copper hair, looking practically goldish in the white light from the single source of light in the room. Vav couldn’t see her eyes because as soon as she appeared, Vav had seen all he dared to see before dropping his head, wincing at the pain his neck gave.

He heard the woman walk up to him before a snap of fingers and large sausage fingers fisted his hair and pulled up, forcing Vav to look up at the woman as she now stood right in front of him and he saw her eyes.

They were almost mesmerizing, a strange looking golden brown, similar to the perfect looking cookie colour if Vav thought about it long enough.

But they had the look of a viper, ready to strike when his walls were down and Vav quickly looked away, staring resolutely at the wall behind the woman’s head.

He flinched when she cupped his cheek, a brilliant smile on her face that reminded him of a viper even more than her eyes. Her lips even looked blood red with the lipstick she wore.

“So.” She drawled, her voice smooth as silk and Vav almost flinched just at that one word. “You are one of the superheroes causing trouble for me?”

Her nails dug into Vav’s cheek and her eyes flashed, before the smile returned. “I’m not sure who I should be annoyed at; you or my people.”

Her grip on his cheek slid down to grab his chin and the hold the man had on his hair left, allowing the viper lady to jerk Vav’s head around, as if trying to find something specific.

“Now, maybe you can tell me who I should be annoyed at.” She lifted his chin so he had no choice but to look at her eyes. “Why haven’t my workers been able to catch the wild boy?”

Vav’s eyes went wide for a second before he desperately tried to school his face. “Wh-what?” He tried, but flinched as the woman’s nails dug into his jaw. God she had sharp nails, they felt like small little blunt knives marking his jaw.

The woman, however, caught Vav’s look before he could reel it in and her head tilted. “You know the wild boy then?”

“What? What gave you th-that idea?” Vav inwardly groaned at the stutter, unable to stop it.

“Hmm.” The viper lady looked unimpressed, her grip painful on his lower jaw before she released him, wiping her hands as if he had germs or something, looking up at the man standing behind Vav. The hand returned to his hair, keeping his head up to look at her while she paced slowly in front of him, as if waiting for the perfect moment to strike.

“How about a better question?” She started, standing in front of Vav. “Where is the wild boy?”

“How would I kn-” Vav started before he cried out as something seemed to zap the back of his neck. But it didn’t feel like a normal accidental zap, it felt like white hot metal filled with electricity was being poked at a sensitive part of his neck and with the hand fisting his hair, he couldn’t even cringe around the area in a poor attempt to protect it.

“I will ask again.” The viper lady’s tone went dark, impatient. “Where is the wild boy?”

XXX

X-Ray and Mogar had gone back to X-Ray’s place, both with the reason that they couldn’t leave X-Ray alone. Mogar was worried for the green suit, who looked so lost without the level headed funny accented one around him to make him laugh, and X-Ray himself had never been alone with no way to contact Vav in years (the last time was when Vav went on a camping trip to buttfuck nowhere for a full two weeks about three years ago) and didn’t want to be alone for the night. He didn’t trust himself being home alone with his best friend missing.

Once they reached his house, X-Ray quickly shucked off his suit in favour of his most comfy pajamas and wrapped himself up in his blanket and just stared at the wall opposite his bed. He clutched one of his pillows so tightly he wasn’t sure if he would be able to let it go after the first hour.

It wasn’t until then that Mogar appeared in his room, the bear pelt removed until he was only in the yellow pants, even the red markings on his arms and cheeks wiped away for the night, that X-Ray even began to relax.

The bear man silently slipped into the cocoon the other man had made around himself, and pulled him to his chest, and X-Ray was actually surprised by how squishy Mogar’s chest was. He had always thought the warrior would have rock hard everything with how aggressively he seemed to live life, but the fact he still had some squish to him was a pleasant surprise.

It was another surprise when Mogar began stroking X-Ray’s hair soothingly, his voice low and rumbling deep in his chest as he spoke.

“We will find him. Mogar promises on mother’s milk.” He said and X-Ray felt himself relax, the warmth of the bear man extra comfort.

The next morning X-Ray found Mogar holding him almost protectively, his large body practically enveloping X-Ray’s slighter form as the two had slept. If X-Ray had been in a different mood, he would have been embarrassed with the closeness, but at the moment, he welcomed Mogar with open arms, just happy he wasn’t alone.

“Mm… Mogar, wake up.” X-Ray mumbled, noticing the time and wiggling to get out of the bear man’s embrace. “C’mon, man, we should get going to that location.”

Mogar woke quickly, looking around quickly as if there would be danger before releasing X-Ray and stretching with a wide yawn, his eyes blinking a little like an owl.

X-Ray quickly changed back into his suit, slipping on his gloves and glasses last before frowning when he saw no sight of the blue and red of Vav beside him. Mentally shaking himself, X-Ray promised himself they would find him today, and he wasn’t going to stop until they found him.

“Should you not eat first?” Mogar asked when X-Ray was about to leave his place once he was ready.

“I… but, Vav…” He gestured out the door helplessly.

“We should have something. Need energy, just in case.” Mogar had a point and X-Ray quickly went back to the kitchen in search of something, finding one of Vav’s energy drinks, as well as a muffin and quickly inhaled both without choking.

“Okay. Ready?” He asked once he finished and was watching Mogar eat his own muffin and orange juice.

Mogar nodded, his pelt and markings back on and the two stood. “Ready.”

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My villain was originally supposed to look similar to Cinder from RWBY, but her appearance quickly changed, so her voice at the very least is similar, or at least in my head it is. I think her name is going to be Shesha Nayar, though we'll mostly know her as Viper Lady.  
> Oh, and look, fluff!


	5. Tracks and Zaps

The alleyway was quiet for the early dawn when the two superheroes arrived, the light soft in the dirty parts of the alleyway.

X-Ray and Mogar split up to either side of the alleyway, making sure they didn’t disturb anything in case there was a clue of where Vav could have gone.

Along with the laser beam, X-Ray’s glasses could be used to magnify anything so he saw everything on the floor with perfect clarity as if he had his head down to the grimy floor.

“Hey.” Mogar called after several minutes of searching silently. He held something small in his hand and X-Ray approached the bear man to see what he found.

It was the butt of an expensive looking cigar, not something that would typically be seen in an alleyway like this. It had been nearly finished, and the embers already long cooled.

“Where’d that come from?” X-Ray asked, and Mogar pointed close to the wall he had been searching.

“Smells weird.” He stated and X-Ray couldn’t help but nod. He wasn’t a fan of cigarettes either. “Is this helpful?”

“Yeah, maybe if it can lead us to Vav. Those cigars don’t normally show up in places like this.” X-Ray shrugged, looking around the alleyway for anything else, but found nothing. He sighed and turned back to Mogar. “C’mon, let’s get back to Hilda. See if this is a lead or what. Give.”

Mogar gave the cigar butt to the green suited hero, who quickly put it in his over-undies and heading out of the alleyway quickly.

They reached Hilda’s faster, the sun now slowly reaching high in the air as they slipped into the building.

“Hilda!” X-Ray called as the two reached the scientist’s labs, but found Orf first. “Oh, Orf, we think we found something.”

“Found something? Like what?” The little robot inquired, while X-Ray pulled the cigar from his undies.

“This was found in the alleyway where Vav’s suit stopped working, right?” He started, putting it on the table closest to them, with the least amount of clutter of science stuff so Orf could examine it. “It looked out of place in a place like that. Maybe whoever took Vav is a smoker?”

Orf hummed and whirred as the little robot scanned the cigar. “Unknown possibility. Cannot be certain of results, fingerprints are corrupted.”

“What do you mean, fingerprints corrupted?” X-Ray demanded as they heard footsteps as Hilda approached them.

“What was what?” The woman asked, looking at the cigar. “What’s that?”

“The closest thing we have to a clue. It was where Vav was taken, but Orf can’t tell for sure.” X-Ray told her.

“Fingerprints are corrupted, it will need more time to decode.” Orf stated simply. “Three fingerprints shown, but muddled together. Sorry. Will take time.”

“Okay, Orf, you go do that.” Hilda told the little sphere, and a light blue beam held the cigar up and moved further into the labs. “Now, there’s nothing else that could’ve helped? No tracks, nothing?”

“There was not enough dirt for tracks, purple one.” Mogar stated. “And wind could have disturbed any possible tracks.”

“Ah, okay.” Hilda worried her lip, leaning against the table with a sigh. “I don’t understand. Why would someone take Vav?”

XXX

“What do you know about the wild boy?” The woman’s voice was starting to hurt Vav’s neck, like every time she spoke, the painful, painful zap was close behind.

Vav shook his head, crying out as whatever the metal thing was pressed hard into his neck, the electricity almost shocking his nervous system.

“You know it would be less painful if you tell me what I want to hear, boy?” Viper Lady seemed to hiss, leaning close to Vav’s face with annoyance written across her face.

Vav shook his head again, protective over his friends and would never tell anyone who had ill intent anything about them. He wasn’t sure why the lady wanted Mogar, but he could already tell it wasn’t to bloody peacefully talk.

With the man’s hand still tightly wound in Vav’s hair, the British man had no way to escape the backhanded slap Viper Lady gave him, and he was certain he had started bleeding as her nails lightly slice his cheek.

“You will tell me what I want to know, boy.” She hissed again straightening up and nodding to the man holding Vav’s head. “We could have done it the easy way, but if you plan to continue to be stubborn, we have ways of making you speak.”

She turned away, heading out the door without another word.

The man let Vav’s head go, and he automatically cringed, hunching his shoulders and ducking his head to try to hide his abused neck. He saw the man step into his line of sight, and saw a piece of metal attached to a tube of some kind and yep, he was right, it had been over heated, the normally silver metal a red-white colour. The man smiled as Vav’s eyes stayed glued to the device as it slowly moved forward, closer and closer to Vav until it was making him cross-eyed as it stopped just before his nose. Vav leant as far back as he could, but the back of the chair was taller than him, preventing him from much movement.

“We’ll get you to sing, little bird.” The man chuckled before pressing the device to Vav’s cheek and all the Brit could feel was blinding pain.

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If only rescue squad knew what was happening to their Brit.


	6. The Secret Layer

Vav took deep breaths, shivering under the blanket even though it was actually getting pretty warm in his cell. His face felt painful and sensitive, along with his neck.

The man seemed to know where it would hurt the most, using the device on almost every free space of skin on the superhero’s face. He would attack just under the ears, where Vav’s Adam’s apple was, both his cheeks, and majority of his neck, stopping just above the collarbone.

He had even placed it on the side of Vav’s neck, so when he cringed instinctively, more of his neck was attacked and it was then that Vav passed out from the pain. He had woken up back in his cell and it was a bizarre feeling to feel relieved seeing the sparse furniture and claustrophobic feeling of not being able to leave the room, but Vav sighed in relief. He was alone, at least, so he guessed that was a plus.

Now that he had time for his thoughts, Vav found himself wondering where X-Ray and Mogar were. It was obvious he had been the only one taken, they wouldn’t have been demanding to know about Mogar if they had him captive as well.

He hoped they were okay, and that they knew where he was. He couldn’t see a way to escape by himself. He had nothing, his gloves had been taken and he wasn’t exactly Mogar strong, hell he wasn’t even strong period. Vav knew he relied on his gloves above his own instincts, which at this point was a bloody stupid thing on his part. Even X-Ray took a bit more care in keeping in shape and knew how to throw a punch when he couldn’t use his glasses.

Vav sighed heavily, dropping his head to the side until it hit the mattress. He was really bloody useless as a superhero, he realized. Without his powers, what was he? A stupid kid in Spandex who was now in over his head, who had been lucky up til now, defeating villains and bad guys with his best friend and then another, who had been quick to worm his way in Vav’s heart like X-Ray had. _Mogar and X-Ray were better heroes than I am,_ Vav seemed to realize now _, they always knew what to do and are much stronger than me._

Vav closed his eyes, shifting the blanket until it cocooned him completely, seeing nothing but darkness as the blanket was thick enough to block out the light.

_Hopefully they’ll find me, at least._ He thought before his eyes burned with the want to cry.

XXX

They didn’t find Vav the day after he was taken, it turned out. Orf had a long time finding the fingerprints, even with the little sphere having the entire database at their disposal

X-Ray couldn’t exactly blame the robot for not being able to find anything, it was a long shot, but with everything passing second was another second that brought them farther from finding his best friend. He couldn’t just take that lying down.

Hilda suggested the two of them still go on patrols, distract themselves until Orf finds something, and just keep their city safe.

“Just because something happened to Vav doesn’t mean you can abandon the city that’s been entrusted to you.” Hilda reminded the two superheroes when they had tried to argue. Several times.

So now X-Ray and Mogar swept the city streets, mostly quiet. Both were normally quiet people, and it was Vav who would start the conversations, or they would start talking if something Vav hadn’t noticed and they were pointing it out to the British superhero. But now there was no Brit walking between them, stumbling over his own long legs, making the strangest noises as he somehow keeps his balance enough not to fall on his ass and causing the other two to laugh and ask if he had too much tea or something.

There must have been something in the air that steered the baddies away today, as they found no one to stop. The two wandered aimlessly through the city, quiet as the breeze until the sun was on its way downward and X-Ray felt like he was going to burst.

“How can we be wandering the street when Vav’s in danger?” He blurted when the two of them were walking down an empty street. He grabbed at his hair, groaning. “Fuck, we’re doing nothing and who knows what’s happening to Vav.”

“We will find him.” Mogar said steadily. “Mogar promised, and Mogar doesn’t break promises.”

“Yeah, well you said we’d find him today and the day is already half over and look at that!” He gestured around them. “We haven’t found him, or even gotten _close_ to finding him.”

“Fine, but we will find him. Mogar won’t stop looking, like when Mother was missing.” That gave some comfort to X-Ray. The determination the bear man had when finding his cow mother had been impressive when he thought back to it, and to know he would give the same amount of determination towards finding Vav seemed to soothe him for the moment.

“Okay, alright. Yeah. We’ll find him.” X-Ray nodded, repeating himself as if by doing that it would make it completely true. He knew he wasn’t the optimistic one, that was Vav, had always been him to keep the two of them (later three when Mogar joined them) looking up, looking for the good, so to have to do it himself, an eternal pessimist most of the time, was not something he was used to.

“Let us return to the purple one. She might have news.” Mogar suggested and X-Ray suddenly wondered how important Vav was to Mogar that he was willing to look for him like he had for his mother. They hadn’t known each other that long, only about half a year at most, and Mogar seemed to like Vav as if he had known him for years.

X-Ray nodded, quickly hiding the curious look he gave Mogar when the bear man looked at him, and they quickly retraced their steps, and for the third time in less than twenty-four hours the two superheroes entered Hilda’s labs.

They didn’t even get to call out to find out where the woman was when Orf came hurtling towards them, a more neutral expression on the screen.

“Identity found, but problem found.” Orf said. “The DNA shows large male named Georg Frey, but…”

“If it is this Georg guy, we have a bigger worry.” Hilda finished, hands rubbing her temples. “He’s normally a gun-for-hire, moving around to different states and cities, but recently he was bought for the past several months by this one woman, a couple cities away.”

“And who the hell is the woman that’s apparently a big worry?” X-Ray demanded.

“Orf, pull up the info we have on her.” Hilda told Orf before turning back to the superheroes. “Her name is Shesha Nayar, owner of a pretty well-known makeup company called The Secret Layer. But, after looking through some of the Mad King’s old records, I knew that name was familiar. She and he used to work together, years and years ago. If she still is doing what she’s doing, finding where Vav is is going to be a lot harder than we thought.”

“How so?” Mogar asked. They were both looking at the picture Orf presented them on the screen. Shesha looked Indian, dark skin, dark hair but strange warm brown eyes that did not seem like she was a villain that had once worked with the Mad King.

“Well, for starters, her city is divided by the forest, and I don’t think I have to tell you how large the forest is, do I?” Hilda commented, and Orf changed to a map area of the city Shesha’s company was and their cities, with the huge forest, Maarf Forest, looking like a green sea between the two. “Not to mention she also has like, several buildings in the city, and even more houses and estates and the like. I wouldn’t be surprised if she owned half the city.”

“Well, trial and error then.” X-Ray said, hands now gripping the closest table edge. “We go through all her places until we find Vav, simple as that.”

“Oh? And what happens if you get caught? Or she doesn’t actually have him?” Hilda demanded, a hand on her hip. “You can’t wander into another city and say stuff like she kidnapped Vav. She’s more powerful in influence than the Mad King was, and if it gets out that X-Ray and Mogar snuck into a woman’s home with the excuse that she took Vav without more evidence would ruin not only your superhero cred, but also the city’s faith in you.”

“Then what do you propose we do, then, smartie pants?” X-Ray ground out, itching to go do something. They were getting closer.

“We find more evidence, narrow down the places Vav could have been taken to. We can’t rush into things, X-Ray, I’m sorry but we have to think things through.” Hilda said before raising a hand. “That includes you, Mr. Muscles. Mogar, you can’t leave either until we have a plan.”

“Plans take too long.” Mogar replied, his back now very straight. “Mogar must save blue suit.”

“We will save Vav, Mogar, we just need to plan a way to get to him.” Hilda argued.

X-Ray sighed, and turned to Mogar. “I hate to say it, but she’s right, man. That’s a lot of places to look through, even with the two of us splitting up or something. If we can at least narrow the search, then maybe we can start, but Hilda’s right about planning.”

Mogar narrowed his eyes before sighing and grumbling, crossing his arms and leaning against a table. “Let us plan then.”

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Going to post two chapters this time, just because.  
> Vav needs a hug. And something for those burns.  
> Also, tiny tidbit, I found Shesha when looking for a female name that meant snake, and it had I believe Hindi traces? Pretty sure it was Hindi, hence why I made her distinctly Indian.  
> She's probs my fave villain I've ever made so far, just because she doesn't look evil like I've normally made my antagonists in my other fics over the years.


	7. French versus English

Vav was given a brief respite, but when the sun set, he heard his cell door open and the burly man returned, dragging him out of his cocoon and out of the cell. For a second he feared he would be brought back into the room with the bolted chair but they past the door, heading for a different room altogether.

The new room was more of an interrogation room, complete with what could only be a two-way mirror along one wall. There was a small metal table and two short metal chairs on opposite sides of the table, one chair with armrests and handcuffs attached to them.

Burly Man forced Vav to sit, cuffing his wrists to the chair with barely enough room to squirm his hands. Unlike last time, he didn’t stay once Vav was tied down to the chair, leaving back through the door and leaving the British superhero alone in the room.

At first he tried pulling on the cuffs attached to the chair, but they were sturdy and clean, and with very little wiggle room to even twist his wrists in the cuffs. He looked around the room again, looking warily at the mirror, wondering if there were people watching him, wondering if Viper Lady was watching him, or if Burly Man had left to watch through the mirror.

He didn’t have long to wait when the door opened and a young woman with blonde hair in a pixie cut walked in, a file held in the crook of her elbow. She wore thick glasses and a white lab coat, looking the part of a classic nerdy scientist.

But her face was hard set, blank to look like ‘resting-bitch-face’ and her eyes looked almost bored as she took in Vav.

“You don’t look like a superhero.” She said in a slight French accent. “Is Georg even certain you are the one causing trouble?”

Vav kept his mouth shut, narrowing his eyes at her slightly. He wasn’t sure what was going to happen, but he understood they wanted information on Mogar.

“No comment?” The French scientist jutted her bottom lip slightly, as if pouting, before she smiled, a mischievous look in her eyes. “Maybe this will make you talk, oui?”

She sat down on the other chair and put the file on the middle of the table, enough so Vav could read the large words written across the front. _X-RAY & VAV_

“My employer, you may have met her already, gave me a little assignment, to find out as much as I could on the two new heroes in a nearby city, going by the aliases X-Ray and Vav. I have to say, you are much more careful than your friend, Vav.” She said, flipping the file open and Vav saw a lot of paper with small writing. He saw security footage stills, and some other candid photos of the two of them, as well as newspaper clippings Ash or someone else had written a story about them. “X-Ray really should watch how to keep his personal life private.”

“I’m not going to tell you anything. Leave X-Ray out of this.” Vav said in a hard voice, angry they were trying to use X-Ray to get him to tell them about Mogar.

“He’s looking for you, you know? And you know the wild boy much more closely than my employer originally thought.” The French girl carried on. “Not like they’ll find anything.” She shrugged. “And even if they do happen upon something, X-Ray will not be able to find you in time.”

“Shut up.” Vav spat, eyes narrowed and barely containing his anger, his hope.

His fear.

“I will if you tell me about the boy. If you comply, we will let you go with only the harm you have so far been inflicted with. Continue to be a stubborn ass and those little pockmarks will be nothing compared to what can happen.” She gestured to his face, with the small red lines and dots from the device earlier in the day.

“I won’t tell you anything about him. Why do you want him, uh? Why does Viper Lady want to know about him so much?” Vav demanded.

The French girl stared at him before she let out a rather pretty laugh for a villain's henchman (henchwoman?). “Viper Lady? Oh that is certainly a new name, I’m certain she will enjoy that one.”

Vav continued to glare at her, face turning a bit redder in embarrassment.

“Why do we want the wild boy? You do not know?” She asked, her smile still on her face. “My employer wishes to use him. He has something we desire and maybe more if you care to share.”

“I’m not telling you anything about him.” Vav repeated and the smile was wiped off the girl’s face.

“If you are so desperate to play hero and stay a stubborn ass, fine. Georg has more toys than heat to play with.” She spat, gathering the papers together before her eyes brightened. “Or we can play a little game of our own. How do you think your precious X-Ray will react to hearing you scream for mercy?”

Vav strained against his bonds, a snarl on his lips not unlike Mogar on some mornings. “Leave X-Ray out of this, bitch.”

The girl smirked. “I will leave your precious X-Ray if you answer our questions.”

Vav’s eyes narrowed and he snarled again.

“Fine. But don’t say I didn’t warn you.” The girl stated simply, standing up and walking out of the room.

Vav growled quietly in the back of his throat, a weird feeling as he did so, but he could understand why Mogar growled like this. He didn’t have any words to express his frustration and worry but somehow the sound vibrating his throat felt like it was communicating just the right amount of frustration and worry that he felt.

Burly Man soon came into the interrogation room with a smirk. He uncuffed Vav while he spoke. “The Miss had told me to have fun. Let’s see how long it takes to break you, British twink.”

Vav just narrowed his eyes, hiding his fear behind the anger he felt if they tried to use his friends against him. It had worked once with the Mad King, and he wasn’t about to make it his big weakness, make it his downfall.

Not again.

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I had a large amount of glee writing the French Scientist Girl(name unknown atm, but it would for sure have something French-like in it) because I quite love the almost ingrained rivalry between the French and English(blame my love for Hetalia for that, too)  
> I hope ya'll liked having two chapters today, because I have already written and ready to go chapters up to 14/15 I think.


	8. Protocol 6-9-17-5

One of the tables was swept clean of science stuff in favour of maps and papers of everything Hilda and Orf could find on The Secret Layer and Shesha Nayar. Mogar focused on the maps, having actually been on at least the outskirts of the neighbouring city during his initial search for his cow mom, while X-Ray focused on the large stacks of paper on the woman’s company. Hilda and Orf were mostly working on finding the buildings owned by the businesswoman and finding anything they could use to help find Vav, if she really had captured him.

There was a lot of information on the woman, talking about her rise to becoming one of the leading companies for makeup. The papers seemed to only have information on the woman along with her company, having started The Secret Layer when she had been finishing university for business.

X-Ray yawned as he read. He couldn’t help it, the words were dry and boring business words, the most interesting thing he found was that she was one of the youngest successful business women in this century at only 24 years old.

But his yawn was cut in half when the doors to the labs opened and Rusty came in, looking mildly worried.

“Uh, Mogar, buddy.” He called, not coming closer to the bear man, keeping the doors open. “You, uh, you really should do something about your home, someone just tried to set fire to your house. Again.”

Mogar straightened, eyes squinting at Rusty before rushing out, X-Ray following behind without a second thought. They followed Rusty out of the building until they reached the edge of the forest, where they could see over the horizon smoky orange and red of a forest fire, not yet too big, but if nothing was done about it, the fire would spread to horrible proportions.

“No!” Mogar shouted, bolting into the forest before Rusty or X-Ray could stop him.

“Shit.” X-Ray muttered, keeping Rusty out of the fire as he ran after Mogar, not entirely sure what he could do against a fire. It wasn’t like he had water vision or something to stop the fire’s advance. If Vav had been there, he could have tried to Slow-Mo the flames enough for the others to put it out before it spread too badly.

They soon reached Mogar’s home, pretty deep in the forest but still pretty close to the city compared to anywhere else the home was close to. It was dangerously close to fire, the trees surrounding the tree house already all caught on fire.

“Mother!” Mogar shouted over the roar of the fire, looking around frantically.

“Mogar, we can’t.” X-Ray coughed as the smoke was swallowed as he took a breath. “We can’t stay here long. We have to put it out.”

“Mother! Where are you?” Mogar seemed to become deaf to X-Ray as he searched for his cow mom until X-Ray put a hand on his forearm, forcing him to turn to face him.

“Shouldn’t we try to put out the fire before we go searching for your mom? She’ll be safer once this thing’s put out.” X-Ray reasoned when Mogar’s lips curled back to bare his teeth at the other hero.

Mogar’s face relaxed as he understood what X-Ray was trying to tell him and nodded. “How do we remove the fire?”

“I… I dunno. Vav’s normally the planner, we’re the front attack people.” X-Ray looked around. “Is there a lake close by? Or a fire station?”

“No.” Mogar answered and X-Ray cursed. He wasn’t sure what to do. He couldn’t very well beat up the fire before a familiar sphere hurtled towards them.

“Orf!” He called, waving to the robot to them. “Hey, think you can turn into a hose or something we can use to put out this fire?”

“Of course! Executing protocol 6-9-17-5.” The little robot said before the sphere quickly changed into a weird looking hose.

“Okay, now we need to find a water source… Mogar?” X-Ray turned to the bear man as he held the hose that was Orf.

Mogar looked thoughtful before he snapped forward, heading towards his tree house, where a large hill stood close by. On the other side of the hill was a large stream, not big enough to be called a river, but not that small either.

“Okay, Mogar, hold this end to the water, make sure we have water to pour out. I’ll put out the fire.” X-Ray said.

It took a while to get the fire under control, but soon the last of the flames were small enough to simply stamp out and the two heroes could see the damage done. There were burnt trees surrounding Mogar’s home, the area of burnt land about half the size of Hilda’s labs, but it looked like nothing worse happened. The two found Mogar’s mother hiding farther away from the fire, on the other side of the stream, which relieved the bear man to see her okay.

“What do you think caused that?” X-Ray asked once they made sure Mogar’s mother was going to be okay and were heading back to Rusty. “It’s too cool to be a natural forest fire.”

“Mogar does not know.” The warrior answered with a frown. “Maybe foul play was involved?”

“Maybe…” X-Ray frowned. “But why?”

“Mogar does not know still.”

“Yeah, I guessed that much.” X-Ray sighed, his frown not leaving him as they reached Rusty, still close to the edge of trees where X-Ray had left him. “Rusty, how did you find out about the fire?”

“I was just walking past here and saw smoke.” Rusty answered. “Thought at first it was Mogar cooking or something like that, before remembering Hilda said you and Mogar were with her almost all day today, looking for clues on Vav’s disappearance.”

X-Ray couldn’t understand how the fire started, or why it started in the first place. It wasn’t coincident that it happened so close to Mogar’s home, but were the perpetrators trying to burn only his home or did they think Mogar was inside as well?

The thoughts and questions started multiplying, like a hydra’s head, for every question he tried to logic his way out, three more popped up and honestly he was getting a headache. Maybe Hilda could think for him on this one, god knows Mogar would have even worse luck figuring it out.

X-Ray rubbed his forehead. “Let’s get back to Hilda. Maybe she got somewhere while we were stopping a forest fire.” He said, shaking his head mentally to put the reason for the fire to the back of his mind, at least for now.

The other two nodded and the three soon made their way to the labs, quiet as they walked. It wasn’t anything against Rusty, who had tried to make conversation with the two heroes; it was just that both were a little wrapped up in their thoughts and on the third hero that should be with them, not in what might be the next city with a big-ass forest between them and that city.

As they got to Hilda’s again, X-Ray just hoped Vav was okay, and that he knew they were looking for him.

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you can guess what the numbers meant, cookies for you. It shouldn't be too difficult, I don't think.


	9. A British V

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Starting next week, I'll be posting two chapters every Friday.

Vav was strapped to a table in a white, white room, so white he was having trouble believing it wasn’t actually heaven and he had died on the table. The room smelled of bleach and several types of cleaners he didn’t know the names and them all combined burned the inside of his nose and even his throat.

Burly Man, whom Vav now guessed was the Georg person the French girl had been talking about, had taken him to this room after the girl had left. Soon Vav was nice and bound to the metal table that looked like those examination tables he saw in movies, like in Frankenstein.

That thought train distracted Vav as he began to wonder if these people had ever made a Frankenstein monster or some other sci-fi monster creature, not noticing where Georg was going or what he was getting around the white, white room.

At least, he was distracted until Vav saw a glint of metal and his eyes went to the small blade in the burly man’s hand. It was too big to be a scalpel but too small to be a dagger, but it looked to be as sharp as either, and he tugged at the restraints holding him down to the table by his wrists and ankles.

“The Miss said I shouldn’t handicap you, which is a shame, really.” The burly man talked down to Vav as the Brit struggled futilely against the leather straps. “But it’s a good thing I know all the best places to have fun with.”

Vav was still tugging and pulling against the straps when he felt the blade be pressed almost lightly against his collarbone and he stilled quickly, eyes wide as he tried to look down, but was stopped by a hand pushing on his forehead.

“Ah ah ah.” Georg tutted, lifting the blade from his collarbone and waving it uncomfortably close to Vav’s face like a wagging finger. “Don’t want to accidently cut something visible, do we?”

All the anger and frustration Vav had during the talking with the French girl fizzled when the blade was brought back down to his collarbone, light enough not to pierce the suit or skin, but enough for Vav to feel it as Georg seemed to trace nonsense over his suit, before he felt Georg trace the large V over his chest. He couldn't tell for certain, the other hand still pushing down on his forehead until it felt like his head was going to split open between the hand and the metal table.

Soon the hand left his head and it was like Vav was given some headache medicine, but the hand instead went to his chest, the base of the hand pressing on his collarbone to keep his chest down.

Then the pain started. God it was like he had dipped the blade in lemon juice or something because as soon as it cut through the suit and a bit of his chest, it _burned._ Vav’s body spasmed as he yelled and tried to twist his body away from the blade. It hurt, it hurt, it _hurt_ , but the hand kept most of Vav’s torso secured, not a chance in hell to escape and the pain just continued, the blade cutting down, slicing the suit like it was paper and his skin just as easily as his suit.

Vav screamed, his body trying desperately to get away from the pain, for it to stop, but got nothing but an amused chuckle and a grin that was a little too happy to see someone else’s blood well up through a blue suit, staining the edges purplish-copper.

The cuts twisted and it was only then, in the haze of pain that Vav realized the tracing was what Georg had been planning to cut. He was cutting out the V symbol from his suit and practically branding it on his chest!

Not like the revelation did anything to stop the man from following the simple lines and Vav pulled and bucked, screaming in pain.

After what felt like an eternity, Georg lifted the blade from Vav, though it took a couple moments for him to register the dragging feeling of slicing skin had stopped. He opened his eyes, not even remembering when he had shut them during the pain, his vision swimming as the pain still coursed through his chest. He had to blink a few times with deep breaths that hurt to take as it pulled on the newly broken skin but he noticed a few things when he could see a bit better.

The first was actually connected to the second in terms of understanding what the hell was going on, as between the areas where he had been cut, it felt strangely cold as the air hit his bare chest in only that specific area. The second was that Georg was holding a paper-thin thing up for Vav to see it, a smirk twisting his face as he waited for the superhero to understand what he was seeing.

It was the union flag, shaped like a crude V, stained with blood along the edges, the stains further along on one side of the V than the other side and bright on the small patches of white from the flag. It took a couple more seconds for Vav to understand that the V Georg was holding was the V from his suit, soaked with his own blood. His face paled at the sight.

“Now, I wonder if I can copy this pattern.” Georg commented, looking at the piece of the suit he had carved out and where it had been before, and if any blood had been close to Vav's face, it would have drained at those words.

* * *

 

Vav’s throat was even sorer from screaming, and his chest stung and ached more than it did if he would get punched in a fight.

Georg had not only cut a crude rendition of the union flag where it had been on the suit into his skin, but he also did the same to the bowler hat that had been on top of the V and cut the lines from the inside of that into his flesh.

After that, Georg nicked and made little slices along Vav’s sides, often prodding the small open wounds until Vav practically howled in pain, his vision spotting or turning white. But he wasn’t allowed the chance to slip unconscious from the pain, oh no, he wasn’t good enough for that. The prodding would spike pain to his head, drawing him back from the brink of unconsciousness, or Georg would twist the blade ever so slightly to cause a new wave of pain that Vav had never known before, and the cycle would continue anew.

Vav wasn’t sure how long it continued but finally Georg was finished, wiping the various blades he had used – Vav hadn’t even noticed when he had changed to another blade. Then again, he wouldn’t have noticed much with the amount of pain he had been in.

“You know? That flag of yours looks much better bloody.” Georg commented with a grin as Vav offered no rebuttal. Vav could hardly breathe without his chest hurting, how would he speak? “Well, in any case, I think it’s time to see the Miss again. See if you loosened your tongue a bit.”

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact, I was actually chuckling when I was writing the "your flag looks better bloody" because history. I am a giant history nerd for any country about anything.  
> Physical torture is not my strong suit... But I tried.  
> Oh, and another fun fact! Way before I even had this idea for the three heroes getting together, I originally wanted just a Movav fic, because I got inspired by "These walls that hold us" by cellostiel(really wish they would continue/finish it, it was really well written).


	10. Friends and Something More

Vav was brought back into the first room with the bolted chair, where it seemed Viper Lady was already waiting for him. She had her back to him and Georg when they entered, only turning around to show the pleased smile when Vav was bound to the chair, her eyes flicking to his chest with a raised eyebrow.

“Interesting choice, Georg. Normally you don’t follow the lines.” She commented, watching the small trails of blood flowing from the wounds.

“Well, I like to shake up my act on occasion, Ma’am.” Georg replied from behind Vav, who couldn’t even look up.

It hurt to breathe, his head felt heavy, and his mind was muddled between fragmented thoughts and the haze of pain that spiked with every breath that wasn’t shallow.

“Maybe you’ve learned your lesson, yes?” Viper Lady walked over to Vav and leant close, holding his chin to force him to look at her. He did so with half glazed eyes, more focused on taking shallow breaths to not disturb the wounds, but to little avail. “My, you are a weak thing. How is it you are a supposed hero?”

Vav’s face scrunched slowly before it found itself in a scowl. “Bite me.” He said with as much bite as he could, which wasn’t much.

“Oh, Georg, looks like he still has some spunk.” The woman smiled thinly.

“Well, I should give him credit if he lives for much longer.” The man behind him answered.

“Oh, he will. Can’t kill him just yet.” By now Vav felt like the two were having a casual conversation, not in fact talking about his upcoming death. “First we should get our information.”

Viper Lady returned her strange brown eyes to focus on Vav and her grip on his chin tightened. “What do you know about the wild boy?”

Despite part of him, a growing minority within him that wanted to give up and tell the woman what she wanted if only to stop any more pain, Vav kept his mouth shut, his eyes glaring with as much anger as he could.

The woman’s face contorted in anger herself and she dug her nails into Vav’s jaw and he grunted when they pierced his skin. “Just tell me what I want to fucking know, you wannabe hero. Why are you so stubborn to protect this boy? Why do you care so much about him?”

Vav mumbled his answer, his eyes never wavering in his glare.

“Excuse me, dear. Can you speak up please?” The woman sounded condescending, leaning closer to hear Vav, pressing her nails deeper into the small marks she’s already made.

Vav grimaced but spoke up, enunciating his words slowly. “He’s my friend.”

“Friend, you say?” She scoffed. “Ha, don’t make me laugh. Why would you be friends with a creature like that?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Vav gave a slight smirk which quickly turned into a grimace and a cry of pain when she backhanded him hard, twisting his head to the side from the force.

“Do not let this whelp sleep.” She ordered. “Do as you wish, but be sure he will still be able to tell me what I want to know. I don’t care; get him out of my sight.”

She quickly stormed off, her dark copper hair trailing behind her and Vav counted that as a win.

“You managed to piss off the Miss. Colour me impressed, brat.” Georg said, having not moved from his place behind him. “Though I wouldn’t count my chickens before they hatch, boy. I haven’t even started having fun yet.”

XXX

Hilda had kicked them out after X-Ray had tossed several papers in the air in frustration, unable to find anything of use.

“We’re tired, and that’s not gunna help us find him. Come back around noon or later, and make sure you’ve at least done a circuit around the city. I will make Orf zap you if you come early or haven’t patrolled. Got it?” She had said, her huge taser gun just within arm’s reach, making the two heroes and Rusty cow and leave.

X-Ray and Mogar returned once more to X-Ray’s place, and they soon found themselves in the same positions as the previous night, Mogar pulling X-Ray to his chest and carding his hand through his hair, soothing and relaxing.

But unlike the previous time, X-Ray didn’t fall asleep right away, and the two were quiet for a long time before the Puerto Rican shifted, having realized something. It had taken a long time in his mind, but he had realized something felt right about Mogar in his bed, curling around him like a living furnace under the blanket, his chest and shoulders a comfortable pillow. But something still felt wrong, like another body should be on his other side, getting the same treatment X-Ray was getting from Mogar.

His fingers twitched, and the slighter man curled in on himself, his mind now going onto offshoots at that thought, confused and tired.

“What’s wrong?” Mogar asked in a low voice, his fingers pausing in their combing through X-Ray’s hair.

“This feels right, but it’s missing something.” The other hero admitted, unsure how else to say it, peeking around his shoulder to look at Mogar.

The bear man had a thoughtful look on his face, his eyes twinkling in the night light coming from the window. “Mogar feels the same. Blue suit should be with us.”

In X-Ray’s mind, he saw the three of them perfectly all of a sudden, curling against one another on the bed, on the couch in the living room. He saw them doing what they had been doing before, but he imagined the closeness of Mogar and Vav, touches that lingered, were more intimate, a thought he had never imagined he would be thinking about before, but it felt… right. There were no other words to describe the idea in his head.

“We will find him.” Mogar seemed to now have that as a mantra, and as it had been for the past couple days, it soothed X-Ray a bit.

“I know, but thinking about it, I want him back now. I can’t imagine what might be happening to him, or why he was taken in the first place.” He said. “He’s in trouble and we’re going so slowly to find him.”

“He is strong. And smart. And once we find them, Mogar will not be letting those who caught him to live long.” There was a promise in the warrior’s low voice that X-Ray was sure Vav would not approve.

“I don’t think Vav would think that’s a good idea, Mogar.” He said, turning his body to face the warrior and wrap an arm around him. “He’d want them to be punished by the law.” His eyes flashed. “But I say fuck that. If they harmed Vav, I’m helping you pummel them to a pulp.”

Mogar gave a small smile, more just baring his teeth in agreement than anything else. “Mogar would like that a lot.”

X-Ray copied his look, baring his teeth in a sort of grin with a dark look in his eyes before he leant forward and rested his forehead on Mogar’s chest, taking comfort in the warmth the other seemed to exude in surplus.

He fell asleep feeling the warrior pulling him close and resting his chin on top of his hair and while it didn’t feel complete, X-Ray was okay with this for now.

They would get Vav, they would save him and maybe the things X-Ray had imagined would actually happen.

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More fluff, look! I'm not heartless!  
> Now if only I could get the knuckleheads to kiss... *schemes*  
> But seriously, even I needed this bit of fluff as a counter for what I'm putting Vav through.


	11. Video Proof

The next morning the two heroes woke to someone buzzing for X-Ray. The two detangled from the other rather reluctantly, and X-Ray quickly shuffled off to find out who was calling for him, finding out it was a delivery. He called for it up, a little confused, since he couldn’t remember either him or Vav ordering something for several weeks, and all those had already arrived by now.

The doorbell rang and the hero answered it, accepting the small package with more than a little bit of confusion, and as he closed the door soon after, he turned to see Mogar squinting at the small package.

“What is it?” He asked.

X-Ray shrugged, heading to the couch to open it, Mogar following.

He turned the package in his hands, hearing something shuffle around inside, so whatever it was, it was much smaller than the small box that held it, and he quickly opened it, squinting as he just realized he wasn’t wearing his glasses.

He picked up the small thing in the box, putting it close to his face to see it was a USB drive, and when he searched in the box once more, found a loose piece of paper. Handing the box to Mogar, X-Ray quickly went to his bedroom to fetch his laptop and his glasses, unable to read whatever might be on the paper that would explain (hopefully) what he had just been given, and as he slid the glasses on, he felt a rush of what felt like dread creep up X-Ray’s spine.

He quickly returned with the laptop and set it down on the small coffee table, looking over to Mogar and noticed there had been another piece of paper in the box, now in the warrior’s hand.

“It is a picture…” There was something in Mogar’s voice that set X-Ray on edge as the bear man handed the paper over to him, whatever picture that was on it, face down.

He turned it around and saw it was a grainy, shitty photo quality of a dark room, lit up with a single light in the middle of the room, with a chair and two people under the light. One person was sitting, mostly hidden behind the other as the other had their body turned away from what could only be a cellphone camera. But what made X-Ray’s heart clench was, although it was grainy and an overall fucking terrible picture in general, he recognized the blue Spandex that covered most of the person sitting down that they could see.

_“Vav.”_ X-Ray breathed the name, hand clutching the picture and wrinkling it immediately.

“What does the other say?” Mogar asked and X-Ray jumped, looking down at the other piece of paper in his hand along with the USB and he quickly dropped the picture to read the paper, which had a short note.

_“X-Ray. Enjoy the video; the following picture is a teaser.”_ He read, scowling at the winking face at the end.

“Video?” Mogar looked over at X-Ray, confused.

X-Ray ignored the warrior in favour of finding out what was on the video, booting up his laptop and plugging the USB in, opening it up to find it had more than a video. Everything was organized into folders, with the only exception being the video that was filed _PLAYME.mov_ and X-Ray clicked it, pulling it to full screen and the two crowded close to watch warily.

It was obviously filmed on a crappy cellphone, with whoever filming with a slightly shaky hand, as if unused to staying still for too long. It was outside a dark room, where the heroes could only see a dark door and hear tinny noise that they couldn’t figure out what it was.

A woman appeared in front of the camera, with short blonde hair and thick, thick glasses that made her eyes look big under the magnifying lenses.

“I supposed I should say hello, X-Ray, if you are watching this, which I believe you will be. “ The woman said in a strange accent, different from Vav’s, but X-Ray couldn’t tell what the accent was.

“You must be wondering who I am and what I’m doing. Well.” The woman gave a smile that twisted the woman’s face into more of a sneer than a smile. “I’m playing a little game with your little friend. One he is hesitant to play, but.” She shrugged, her sneer still twisting her face. “It does not really matter what he wants right now. As you can maybe hear, he is a little busy at the moment.”

She went quiet, looking at the door she stood in front of, and the two heroes strained to hear as a single shout came at that moment.

Mogar growled, leaning forward as if to attack the woman on the screen, but X-Ray held him back. “We can’t do anything, this already happened.” He told him.

“Let’s go see, shall we?” The woman suggested, turning around and putting the phone in front of her as she opened the door, where the shout became crystal clear.

The woman walked into the room, the camera wobbling as she walked to one corner of the room, making things hard to see except for around the one point of light. They could hear the scream seem to burst out before heavy panting and a low chuckle.

They saw Vav sitting on the chair under the light, most of him covered by the person in front of the chair, doing something to him, but what that was, neither hero could tell.

“Just give it up, brat.” The person, a man from the sounds of it, said in a deep voice, tinny through the speakers and the distance from the microphone in the phone.

Vav might’ve answered or not, the two couldn’t hear him if he had, but it was apparently not the answer the man wanted, because the man pressed close to him and another scream echoed through the room and the speakers and both Mogar and X-Ray stiffened at the sound.

The woman holding the camera giggled, and if it wasn’t at the expense of Vav being hurt, X-Ray would have found the giggle charming. She strode forward, moving to one side of the man to allow the camera to see Vav more clearly than before and X-Ray wanted to punt his laptop.

He looked tired, eyes half open, and red welts and marks scattered around his face, dried blood leaving trails down his jaw from multiple places and one major cut on his cheek which still seemed to be bleeding.

His neck was just as red as his face, looking like he had been burned with something small and a particularly bad red line above the hollow in his neck from what the two heroes could see.

But it was his chest that had both Mogar and X-Ray stop their breathing and Mogar specifically, seeing red for a moment. The large V and weird hat had been cut away from Vav’s suit, apparently while the Brit was wearing it, and the cuts had been pretty deep, the skin visible bright red and raised. Apparently whoever had cut out the suit had decided it would be brilliant to copy the logo completely on his skin, leaving blood trails falling and staining Vav’s blue suit. There were other cuts along both sides of his body, from the raised clips of the suit and they saw thin lines along the tops of Vav’s bare arms.

The man was leaning too close to Vav as he repeated himself. “Answer us.” He demanded, but Vav bared his teeth in response.

“I’m not telling you shit.” He snarled, and X-Ray blinked. He had never seen his best friend sound like that, and while he would have liked to be proud of Vav, he saw something in his eyes that belayed his apparent anger.

The man gave a growl of his own before the two heroes saw a knife in his hand, gripped with the blade straight down and he slammed his fist down, the blade disappearing in Vav’s arm, close to the elbow and the scream Vav made caused the two heroes in X-Ray’s home to jump in distress. Halfway through the scream Vav’s voice cracked, and when the man twisted the knife still embedded in his arm, it quickly turned itself into a cry, tears pricking and spilling down the Brit’s face.

“Please! Please!” He started to plead, his voice cracking under the strain and X-Ray had found his hand in Mogar’s, both of them squeezing the other’s hand tightly.

“Then tell us about the wild boy!” The man demanded as he continued to twist and they could hear the soft giggle from the woman.

“Fuck you.” Vav tried to growl, but with his voice cracking and the tears, it just sounded pathetic but the man ripped the knife out of his arm anyway, another cry of pain coming from Vav.

“Well, I have to say, your precious X-Ray is going to love this.” The woman said when Vav quieted down to strained pants.

Vav’s head snapped up, fury in his eyes as he noticed the phone pointed at him, but X-Ray could also see the fear.

“I told you to leave him out of- _AHH_!” Vav screamed, his pitch rising until it cracked, as the man grabbed the wound, pressing hard against it, as if trying to widen it with his bare hands.

The video ended there, pausing at Vav’s face, contorted in pain, head jerking back to hit the back of the seat he seemed to be trapped in, his hands starting to spasm and he looked like he was desperate to escape.

With a roar that startled X-Ray, Mogar jumped to his feet, hands twitching as they curled and uncurled and he paced, a deep growl emanating from him as he seemed to be looking for something to break or kill, but found nothing that wasn’t probably important to X-Ray.

“They will pay. They will die. Mogar will kill them dead.” He shouted, his teeth bared at nothing, and on the one hand, X-Ray was agreeing with the bear man, but on the other, he was afraid of him. “They are dead!”

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got the idea of the kidnapper sending videos from this really dark fic called... Catch Two Tigers(and when I say dark, I mean like uber super dark. Go read it! It's mavinwood!)  
> After Am I a Hero is finished, which work should I focus and post on?  
> 1: His Mad Game (basically it’ll be following the Minecraft Most Dangerous Game X with squint-and-you’ll-see-it pairings, and plot twists *andasecretray*)  
> OR  
> 2: Team Super Lads (based on a tumblr post about a supervillain becoming a super worried parent where the lads get superpowers and Ryan gets a super-headache*or3*)  
> I have at least the first chapter for both written and ready, and a vague idea where each story will go, but just send me a message or something with which you’d want to read first!!


	12. Realization

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Omg, this fic has reached over 1000 hits omg I'm so happy!  
> thank you so much i'm so happy ;u;

Mogar had a very large, very angry aura around him ever since the two had seen the video, the anger radiating off him as hot as the sun to the point Hilda put him in a room so he could blow off some steam, giving him things to break that she had no use for anymore.

“Well, he can break them and I could reuse the pieces that are still usable.” She had shrugged when X-Ray had asked why she was giving Mogar some pretty important looking experiments. “And I’d rather know what he’s breaking before he breaks them.”

So while Mogar dealt with his anger, X-Ray, Hilda and Orf tried to use the new information they were given from the USB. They kept it in X-Ray’s computer, Hilda adamant about the possibility there was a virus or something encrypted in the little stick among the many files.

“Anything that could be corrupted on this piece of junk is replaceable.” She said, nodding to the laptop as she looked quickly through the files on the USB. “Not so easily replaceable if it’s on my computers, or even Orf.”

X-Ray couldn’t even deny that. It wasn’t like there were big secrets on his computer like there were on everything in Hilda’s labs, but he was worried about some of the saved games he had downloaded onto his computer getting screwed that he would have to get again and play from scratch, which was more of an inconvenience than totally, absolutely important.

The Puerto Rican hovered around the scientist as she worked, having nothing else to do, and certainly didn’t want to be in Mogar’s way for at least another hour by the intensity of metal being smashed against steel or whatever made up the reinforced walls in the room he was currently in. He wanted to talk, but at the same time, knew it wouldn’t be good to annoy the only one who could probably get information from the USB, so he opted to watch as Hilda worked.

Hilda read everything carefully but quickly, the wireless mouse that was plugged in clicking and moving in what seemed like circles as she searched. She gave huffs of annoyance, muttering under her breath about ‘slow-ass regular computers’ before she would again start typing.

After a while, X-Ray drifted away, knowing he wasn’t very helpful in the brainstorming smart department, finally drifting closer to Mogar’s room. There was a large window that looked in from the hall that was now a spider web of cracks from what looked like a punch to the very middle of it. X-Ray whistled at the cracks. So Mogar wasn’t stronger than a bullet, but could sure pack a punch like one (Ha, terrible pun).

Through the web of cracks, X-Ray saw a humanoid shape with Mogar’s colours at one end of the room, leaning against the wall with his hands holding his face. It seemed he finally used up most if not all his rage for the moment and the other hero deemed it safe to slowly open the door, poking his head into the room first.

The room was a mess of wires and broken metal and plastic and nuts and bolts and who-knew-what-else that made up the experiments Hilda was okay with getting broken, with Mogar against the far wall, small scratches and cuts from what could have only been from the shrapnel when he had thrown the machines along his shins and arms, but nothing was bleeding the strange glowing blood Mogar bled. Mogar himself leant heavily against the wall with his hands pressing hard against his face, or at least his eyes, and as X-Ray fully stepped in the room, Mogar leant his head back until it hit the wall, a long, deep sigh rushing from him.

“You okay now, man?” X-Ray asked in a soft voice, only a little bit apprehensive after seeing the destruction Mogar wrought in the room. He was now more than ever glad Mogar wasn’t his enemy.

Mogar grunted, not moving from his place, and he opened his mouth a couple times before shutting them again until he found what he wanted to say. “They were after Mogar.”

X-Ray frowned, closing the door behind him but not stepping farther into the room. “What?”

“They wanted to know about the ‘wild boy.’” Mogar said, his voice hoarse from the angry shouting he had kept up for half the day. “Who else but Mogar is a wild one?”

X-Ray’s eyes widened as he understood, remembering what the man that had been attacking Vav in the video had said, after he had stabbed Vav’s arm. X-Ray’s arm unconsciously twitched and he winced.

“They are harming him because of Mogar.” Mogar also winced at his own words, his hands falling limply from his face and X-Ray saw his eyes were red-rimmed and puffy as a tear fell onto his scowl. “Mogar is the reason he had been taken.”

“Mogar, no.” Finally X-Ray went further into the room, until he was a couple steps away from Mogar, hands outstretched to grab his arms but a little hesitant. “It’s not your fault for anything. Don’t fucking say shit like that.”

“But it is true. Blue suit… _Vav_ would not be taken if not for Mogar.” The warrior stressed Vav’s name, a first to call Vav by his name.

X-Ray stuttered, trying to prove to Mogar that it wasn’t his fault, but found nothing. So they were after Mogar for some unknown reason, and had taken Vav because… Why? Because he knew him? Because he was in the same city Mogar was in most of the time? Why would they capture Vav?

“They might be after you, but it isn’t your fault they’re after you.” He finally settled with, finally grabbing one of Mogar’s arms by the bicep. “I don’t know why they’re after you, but they will pay two-fold for it. For taking Vav from us and for trying to get to you for god-knows-what reason.”

“He would not be in danger if not for Mogar.” The bear man couldn’t get past that detail, his voice dripping with guilt, as if he caused Vav’s capture.

“Mogar, it is _not_ your fault.” X-Ray shook Mogar’s arm slightly, ducking down to meet the bear man’s gaze sternly. “It’s about as much your fault as it is mine that Vav got fucking kidnapped. We are getting him back, so it doesn’t really matter either way. We’re gunna save Vav, and beat up everyone who had a hand in hurting him.”

Mogar’s eyes were vulnerable, scared and guilt mixing in his brown eyes, so unlike any other time X-Ray had looked in the warrior’s eyes before and it worried him. Mogar had always been the strongest throughout everything the three had been through, even when he had been looking for his cow mom, and to see how learning about the reason why Vav was taken was too much for the bear man felt like someone had shot a gun filled with ice into X-Ray’s chest.

He grabbed Mogar’s face lightly with both hands, his gloved thumbs rubbing lightly under Mogar’s eyes, getting rid of any wayward tears that slipped unbidden over the warrior's sun-kissed skin.

“Stop thinking it’s your fault.” X-Ray demanded in a soft voice that was still stern, shaking Mogar’s head lightly between his hands, keeping his gaze on Mogar’s eyes. “We can figure this out _after_ we have Vav with us, okay? Stop this.”

It turned into almost a staring contest of sorts between the two heroes after that, Mogar with his guilty, sad-filled eyes and X-Ray with his stern, almost pleading eyes until Mogar broke the eye contact, but not before X-Ray saw the guilt leave him. Mogar nodded beneath the other’s hands, and X-Ray could practically see Mogar’s thought process change.

He removed his hands from Mogar’s face, his lips twitching as he took a step back. “C’mon, let’s see if Hilda found anything.”

Mogar nodded and the two headed out of the wreck of a room, newly determined to find Vav. They had to find him. They weren’t about to give up until they had the British hero safe and sound with them.

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am really happy with how this chapter turned out. Feels like the perfect amount of angst and fluff for my ever growing love for X-Ray/Mogar


	13. Dizzy and Tired

Vav came to slowly, his entire body in pain and felt like it was filled with lead instead of blood.

He found himself standing… Scratch that, hanging by his wrists bound by large heavy handcuffs with his legs barely touching the floor and his back against a smooth wall. Vav flopped his head back to look at his wrists, frowning when he couldn’t feel them, nor could he get them to move when he wanted them to move. At most, he only got his fingers to twitch painfully, causing the Brit to wince at the stabbing pain coming from his fingers, as well as the large puckered wound close to his elbow on one arm. Vav could barely remember how he had gotten the wound, his mind in a haze of pain and confusion. He remembered getting shouted at by Burly Man, Georg, then he thinks he remembers seeing the French girl with something in front of her face, but anything else was lost to the British hero.

He heard a door creak open noisily, and he slowly dropped his head back down to see. It was the Viper Lady, alone, who came into the room, striding confidently to Vav.

“I hope you had a pleasant rest, boy.” She said with a smirk, standing just a couple feet away from Vav. “I doubt you could forget why I’m here.”

Vav just stared without really seeing, his eyes unfocused as the pain numbed everything. He didn’t see the smirk grow into a full blown grin.

“Will you now tell me?” Her voice slipped through the pain like silk, weirdly comforting to Vav, though through his pain he wasn’t sure why it was comforting. His mind felt muddled and he slowly scrunched his face as he couldn’t understand what Viper Lady was asking from him.

“Tell me about the wild boy.” A hand cupped his cheek, almost kind in the action and Vav blinked, trying to clear his head.

“Mean Mogar?” His words were slurred and dry, as if he hadn’t had anything to drink for a long time.

“His name is Mogar?” The words sounded surprised. “I didn’t know the wild thing had a name.”

“Course he bloody does.” Vav frowned, his mind now sending up red lights but he was too tired to figure out why.

“Why don’t you tell me about him?” Viper Lady asked, her cookie coloured eyes making him dizzy.

Vav squinted at her as the warning bells made sense. “No.” He said slowly but forcefully, inwardly smiling when the smile fell from the woman’s face.

“This is your last chance, boy. Your partner will not find you in time, if he ever does. But I will get what I want either way.” She said, nails digging painfully into the side of Vav’s face before they quickly slid up to grab a large handful of hair. “So you would do well to tell me before you die.”

“I won’t sell out a friend.” Vav said in how he hoped was with the least amount of slurs.

“Why?” Viper Lady snapped, tossing Vav’s head away from her in disgust. “It’s not like you will be alive to see the betrayal of ‘selling out a friend’.”  Her words dripped with venom and annoyance.

“Rather die than let a bitch like you even come near him.” Vav spat, his mind clearing a little bit so he could focus on the conversation.

Viper Lady scowled at Vav before slapping him hard across the face and his mind was once again lost as it spun in dizzying circles from the force.

“You little-!” She cried, and it seemed Vav’s stubbornness could outlast Viper Lady’s patience, as her composure broke to pieces. Her face radiated anger, her nostrils flaring and her eyes piercing.

She went after any and every part of Vav that was still vulnerable, which meant every single part of him that wasn’t touching the wall. She kicked, punched, pulled him painfully away from where he was handcuffed, as if trying to pop his arms out of their sockets, and whacked his head against the wall so many times Vav was constantly seeing stars, as well as feeling something warm and sticky clinging to his hair and rolling sluggishly down his neck. Vav couldn’t remember if he made a sound during the entire beating as the haze and numb feeling returned to cloud his mind, at least for the second half of the beating.

When she was finished, Vav was breathing shallowly, eyes hooded, only a sliver open but he was unseeing, and his body sagged, not even feeling the strain he put on his cuffed hands.

Before Viper Lady left, she grabbed him by his hair, gripping tightly until Vav looked at her properly. “I should kill you, but I have one more way to make you sing.”

She promptly flung his head back and stars burst before his eyes before the creeping darkness overtook him.

XXX

“It does narrow down the locations a bit, but there’s still a shit ton of places we would still have to search.” Hilda said, finally turning away from the laptop to face the two heroes, who had been waiting for something for several hours, even after checking over the city. This time they had stopped a mugging of a young couple, but the criminal had obviously been desperate, so instead of beating the young boy, X-Ray and Mogar simply told him to seek help and to turn himself in.

“Really?” The two asked, eager to learn how many they would have to search to find Vav.

“Yeah, going from the look and darkness of the video, even though the file says it was shot in early morning, when the sky would have been showing more light than what was able to be seen in the shitty quality, we can safely assume it’s below ground. That leaves out all the apartments and skyscrapers that Shesha or her company owns. I can also say, unless they have soundproofed in that basement area, that they aren’t in any of her factories. We would have been able to hear the loud whirring of machinery or some shit if they were keeping Vav there. Which leaves us with the homes Shesha owns around the city.” Hilda sighed as she turned to the laptop and revealed a big list of addresses. “This sadly means there are about fifteen different places around that city that could be holding our idiotic Brit.”

“Fifteen houses?” X-Ray cried, incredulous. “What does a person need fifteen houses for?”

“Your guess is as good as mine.” The scientist shrugged with a weary sigh. “And the thing is, because they are underground somewhere, it doesn’t help narrow down the houses she owns. Some are small bungalows while a couple are about as big as mansions.”

“Maybe… Maybe we can see where that girl and the man work at?” X-Ray asked.

“No, no… Wait…” Hilda paused mid-scratching her tired eyes, looking thoughtful. “I didn’t do that… God I’m an idiot. I need sleep…” She yawned before whistling. “Orf!”

“Yes?” The little robot flew over, having been dormant to charge itself, a more chipper tone in its artificial voice.

“I need you to look up where those two people in the video work in. I would, but I haven’t slept since 3 this morning.”

“Of course!” Orf said in its chipper tone, turning and flying off somewhere else to do the research.

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It looks like after Am I a Hero, Team Super Lads will be published first! I've decided that I will be publishing that the Monday after this fic is finished. So, on the 15th of August!  
> As for His Mad Kingdom, I have already posted a prequel to the main story, called "The Rose is Red, His Rose is Dead" and I'm thinking of publishing that when I'm finished writing my Mavin fic, The Memory of You.


	14. Intruder

It was nearing the third night without Vav and X-Ray was restless.

Even with the, admittedly crappy quality, photo of the girl, and the information they had on Georg Frey already, finding where they were specifically working in was taking forever, even with a supercomputer and super robot working in tandem.

So Hilda pushed the two of them out of the labs, promising she wouldn’t sleep until she either collapsed or narrowed the search window enough.

But that didn’t stop X-Ray from his restlessness. He barely remembered to change into pajamas before scooting to his side of the bed while he waited for Mogar to de-mark himself, not even pausing to wonder why he suddenly had a side on his own bed. He slipped under the blanket and pulled it around him again, sitting with his back on the headboard.

Mogar returned and like always slipped in the blankets to his spot as X-Ray’s unofficial pillow, but he didn’t card his fingers through his hair this time. He simply wrapped his arms around X-Ray and held him close, and with it only being the two of them, X-Ray felt more than saw Mogar’s walls fall like broken china, suddenly and startling.

This time X-Ray found himself clumsily threading his fingers through unruly copper-brown hair, finding some impressive knots and tangles that took some gentle teasing to undo.

The two were silent for several minutes as they listened to the other’s breathing, before X-Ray heard Mogar’s change, breath hitching, and his face found itself burying into the crook of X-Ray’s neck.

“He is hurting while we are safe.” Mogar’s voice mumbled, strained with emotion. “He is being harmed while we continue to do nothing.”

X-Ray shushed him, tilting his head to lean on top of Mogar’s, his hands now wrapping around the bear man in a hug. “We’ll find him. You said so yourself.” He said in a soft voice with as much conviction as he could. “Tomorrow, we’ll have the address or addresses to search and we’ll find Vav and beat the crap out of those assholes for what they’ve done.”

“He looked so hurt.” Mogar mumbled, arms tightening around X-Ray in a somewhat protective way. “Mogar never wants to see either one of you in so much hurt.”

“That’ll be a little tough, buddy. Heroes get hurt sometimes.” X-Ray tried to joke, but even to him, the joking tone fell flat. So he tried a different approach. “But that won’t matter. Know why? Because we’ll always have one another to help us get better to fight again.”

Mogar was silent, before he pulled back to face X-Ray in the dark. X-Ray could see – almost perfectly clearly with the little distance between them even without his glasses (which he gave the X-Ray specs to Hilda to upgrade during the night for the upcoming rescue) – Mogar’s face just under a ruler’s length from him, small freckles barely visible in the low light, his eyes searching for something, but what, X-Ray couldn’t tell.

He was about to ask the bear man what he was doing when soft, chapped lips surprised him, the kiss lasting only a couple seconds and full of emotions that swirled in X-Ray’s head until he was dizzy, but it felt oh so much longer.

X-Ray blinked, his eyes unfocused as they just stared at the bear man that curled around him, his face back to his neck, as if hiding.

“What was that for?” He asked after several heartbeats had past, and resisted shivering at the warm breath tickling his skin.

“If something happens.” Mogar replied. “Mogar has, uh, admired your strength and stupid courage.”

X-Ray’s face softened and he leant his head on Mogar’s. “Nothing’s going to happen to us. We’re going to get Vav, and who knows, maybe we’ll be able to kiss without the thought of ‘something happening.’” He smiled, knowing Mogar couldn’t see it.

* * *

 

Mogar was going to have to convince his dark haired idiot to let him keep his sword, or even his dagger, within arm’s reach after this; he realized when he woke when X-Ray thrashed in his grip. Mogar jumped to alert to see another figure that should not have been there grabbing for the smaller.

With a roar he pounced on the intruder, tearing his grip away from X-Ray to protect himself as Mogar landed a heavy blow.

“Don’t you dare touch him!” He shouted.

He was pulled away from the intruder a couple seconds later, the man soundly unconscious but it took a couple seconds for it to register that he was no longer a threat to Mogar or X-Ray.

“Stop, stop! He’s done, he’s down. Calm down, Mogar!” X-Ray shouted, his hands on Mogar’s shoulders to calm him enough to listen.

The two were breathing heavily, Mogar from the sudden burst of adrenaline and X-Ray from the sudden unwelcome wakeup call of being grabbed, and looked at the man on the floor.

“What the hell was that about?” X-Ray wondered, trying to not sound as shaken as he was. “Who the hell is this guy?”

“Mogar does not know… But he tried to hurt you. Are you okay?” The bear man turned to X-Ray with concern.

X-Ray nodded, looking down at himself as if to double check before nodding, more sure, again. “Fine, fine. A little shocked, the bastard practically ripped me from you.”

Mogar quickly went right to X-Ray and wrapped his arms around him, nuzzling his face on top of the smaller’s head. He hummed in relief that X-Ray was not harmed and finally the adrenaline left him, taking stock of everything.

It was still dark, although now turning pale grey with the upcoming dawn, and the door to X-Ray’s room was wide open, different from when the two had fallen asleep before. Keeping a protective, almost possessive hold on the smaller hero, Mogar led them out of the room, seeing if anything else was moved or something, or if there was another in the apartment besides the one intruder.

They found nothing besides one of the windows, the one that led to the fire escape, had been shattered, surprising both men as they had not heard a thing. That explained how the intruder got into the place, but it still begged the question: Why? Why had he come to the apartment? Why had he tried to grab X-Ray while he slept?

Growling when no answer came to mind, Mogar dragged X-Ray back into the bedroom where the man was still out cold.

“I think…” X-Ray sounded small, younger than he was, and Mogar rubbed his cheek on the top of his head. “I think we should bring him to Hilda. I think he might have been sent by the bitch who took Vav.”

Mogar grunted in agreement, still glaring at the unconscious intruder, but now with a different thought running through his head. If the man had been sent by the woman who held his Vav and had been hurting him, getting him to answer truthfully could actually help.

He finally released X-Ray to pick up the intruder, throwing him over his shoulder. “Let us go, then.”

When the smaller hero didn’t move as Mogar went out the room, he turned back with a confused look.

“Let me change first. Don’t forget your own shit, we might not be coming back if this is a real lead.” X-Ray said and despite the idea of waiting around, Mogar could understand a bit of what the other hero was talking about, and so he quickly tossed the intruder onto the couch in the living room before putting on his pelt and heading to the mirror to put on his markings, the markings that proved he was a true warrior.

It was less than ten minutes before the two heroes were ready, and Mogar went to grab the intruder again, and they left for Hilda’s, both apprehensive and hopeful that they would finally have all they needed to get their blue suited Brit back.

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tried to use Mogar's POV, not sure how good it was... He's kinda hard to pin down a personal voice for, at least for me.


	15. Begging

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Longest chapter, whoop whoop  
> Also, I'm sorry.

The early dawn filtered in through the barred window of Vav’s cell, almost mocking him in its prettiness. He had finally been brought back into his cell room hours after Viper Lady had beat him and left him in the hanging room. He could no longer feel his arms or move them at all, before suddenly such intense pain, fifty times worse than pins and needles taking over the numbness and if Vav could have, he would have shrieked in absolute pain.

As it was, he could only whine and whimper with every uncontrollable twitch and shift he made.

With the small respite he was given, it allowed Vav to think, or think as well as he could with the pain splitting his mind. He still had very little idea why the Lady wanted Mogar so bad, or even what the ‘other way’ to make him tell was, but it sent dread coursing through him as his imagination went wild. His most logical thought was that they would go after X-Ray, and maybe even Mogar himself, since they seemed to know he was friends with the two already, but after that, his mind came up with images of battered, broken, even dying X-Rays and Mogars, and he couldn’t help but let tears slip. Sobs were too painful, on his chest which was finally scabbing over (but who knew if it was infected or not. Vav couldn’t tell: his body hurt so much it was numb to all pain at this point), and his arms which gave white hot flashes of pain with every movement they made since waking up in the cell room a few hours ago.

So silent, hot, heavy tears and shallow, shuddering breaths were the closest Vav could get to sobs for the moment.

He just wanted the pain to stop. He wanted it to end, to not hurt anymore, he wanted it so badly he almost wished he had told them what they wanted when they had first asked.

A hot, burning shame filled him at that thought, along with rage at himself and at his situation for making him think such things. He could never, and would never again give up his friends. It had only ended in heartbreak the last time, with all those he cared for – X-Ray, Mogar, even Ash when he had been infatuated with her (he still cares for her, but now as a friend after figuring out they weren’t too compatible as a couple) – turning their backs to him because of the Mad King. He still remembered the heart stopping moment when he had honestly thought he had lost X-Ray when he had been strapped to that metal table, that scary device pointing at him like Death itself was a couple seconds away.

He had vowed to not let any villain get between him and X-Ray, and later with Mogar as they started teaming up to fight crime. He never wanted another incident where he would have to choose to save someone, especially between those he cared so much for.

He turned slightly to face the barred window again, face twisting into a grimace as pain shot through his arms, causing them to spasm which caused more pain, and a high pitched keening whine escaped him. He closed his eyes and focused on his breathing, trying to think of anything besides the sharp pain in the entire lengths of his arms.

When he opened them again, he looked outside, seeing only the wall of the building just across from where Vav’s cell was situated, the grey light of dawn slowly brightening to early morning. He wasn’t too sure how long he had been kidnapped. It couldn’t have been too long, he couldn’t imagine. Sure, his stomach ached with lack of food since before he had been taken, but starving was actually very low on his list of concerns at the moment. His highest concern was the pain he felt everywhere, from the burns that still stung around his head, to his cut up chest and heavy, pins-and-needles arms, to his legs which although nothing had been done to them, felt as heavy as his arms and unable to hold his weight. But whether that was from being weak from hunger or some other reason, Vav wasn’t too sure, all he knew for certain was that he could barely move, let alone sit up or stand without his legs giving out. He should feel grateful he had been dropped on the bed instead of just being dropped as soon as Burly Man, Georg, had brought him to his cell.

Somehow Vav managed to fall asleep, despite the constant pain he felt everywhere, but it wasn’t restful. He kept seeing the images of X-Ray and Mogar, broken or hurting and always just out of reach, with his mind screaming at him that it was his fault, that he caused this. Sometimes he saw Georg or the French girl hurting them, but the worst parts were when Vav saw his own face on Georg’s body, a cruel and twisting smile transforming his face in grotesque ways as he choked X-Ray or bashed Mogar’s head against a wall, all the while the two would be begging for mercy, voices cracking and screams mingling with Vav’s own as he watched, unable to escape the nightmare.

When he was finally freed of the nightmare, screaming as his eyes shot open and he shot up, momentarily forgetting his pain and his current situation, and when he did, he wasn’t sure if he would have rather stayed in that nightmare or have woken up. At least within the nightmares, they weren’t real, they were just thoughts manifesting themselves into horrible, horrible scenarios, but at least Vav would know they weren’t true. But with the waking world, he felt the pains he had been thankfully not had in his dreams, and everything that happened was actually true, not a product of his mind meant to scare him.

He was still waking up when his cell door opened and Georg came in, a smirk on his face, his eyes still hidden by the sunglasses that haven’t been removed since Vav’s blindfold had been taken off. He went straight up to Vav, and when he grabbed his arm, the Brit screamed, trying to move away, but his body, finally not as numb as the pins and needles feeling was leaving him as proper blood circulation was finally working again, was too slow, and only managed to piss off the burly man. He was suddenly lacking oxygen as Georg wrapped a large hand around his neck, squeezing his windpipe. Not enough to crush it, but just enough for Vav to not even scrape a single gasp of air into his already struggling lungs, and he was still too weak to struggle.

When Vav slumped, his vision spotty, Georg loosened his grip and the Brit took huge gulps of air, wincing as some of the wounds on his chest reopened but he didn’t really care. Air was priority at the moment.

Georg lifted Vav up by his neck, making it difficult to follow his number one priority as he struggled uselessly to take more than a small gasp of air at a time. He was so focused on trying to just breathe that he didn’t look around to where they were going this time, but in the back of his mind, he knew it didn’t really matter. He was still going to be hurt because he was not going to tell them shit. He knew the longer he remained stubborn, the more likely he was just going to be murdered, but at this point, Vav would rather welcome death than having those horrible images of X-Ray and Mogar become reality because of him.

He was dropped in a dimly lit room, that even the small windows that lined one wall couldn’t light it up more with the morning sun. After ensuring he wouldn’t pass out from asphyxiation, Vav looked around the room, noting in distant interest that it was another new room, but that meant new bruises and cuts and hurts he wasn’t expecting. It was small, about the size of his cell room, but with even less furniture. The floor was made of rough concrete, scraping up the spandex of his suit and his palms from when he had held them out to soften the fall. He could tell the impact on his palms caused them to bleed, but they were superficial comparatively, and the spandex suit was more durable than to shred apart from rough concrete.

There were no lights in the room, which explained why it was so dimly lit with only the little windows offering any sort of light, and all the walls were a dark gray, but Vav wasn’t sure if they were concrete or metal and frankly he couldn’t care less.

In the middle of the room was a table, not unlike the one from the white, white room where Georg had carved into him, but with some sort of contraption hanging above it where the head would be, as well as a restraint for the head as well.

Vav was pulled up by the hair, a cracked cry that quickly changed to whimpering as he was dragged to the table, pulled up and strapped down tightly, much more tightly than he had been for any of the other rooms. The head restraint was added, tightly pressed on his forehead, enough to almost already cause a headache threatening to split his head open, and Vav found out there was a circle shaped hole at the very top of the restraint that served no purpose, at least from what Vav could understand.

It wasn’t until Georg grabbed something that he hadn’t noticed before and filled the contraption above his head that Vav realized it was water, surprisingly cold water at that. Georg didn’t say a word as he allowed the icy cold water to slowly, slowly, oh so slowly drip, drip, drip onto his forehead, right where the circle was on the restraint. No matter how hard Vav tried to wiggle away from the water, the restraint held down his head and soon water droplets fell into his eyes, forcing them closed. Soon he was forced to just feel the icy water inconsistently drip onto his head and Vav couldn’t understand what was going on.

His breath picked up, and his head hurt, feeling like it was splitting open in more ways than one and all he could think of was how it hurt, how he wanted it to stop, to end, to just stop already! He was no longer sure if the water that welled up in the corners of his eyes were tears or from the drip drip dripping water, but he couldn’t care less which it was. He just wanted to sleep, to not feel.

He didn’t know how long he had been restrained and forced to endure the water dripping onto his head and even less sure how long he had been screaming incoherently, but he was sure at least two hours had passed. There were times he was coherent enough, often begging for it to stop, to just end it already.

Begging for death.

He didn’t care anymore. He only knew he wasn’t giving up Mogar to these villains, and the only way out of this was death, at least that was his thought. So he begged, thrashing in the restraints, deaf to the world besides the incessant and inconsistent water droplets.

If he had been aware of the world, he would have heard his name being called, would have heard shouts and flesh hitting metal or flesh hitting flesh, would have known something was going on. He was deaf to the words, to the sounds around him, deaf even when they became louder, deaf even when the water stopped, deaf even when the restraints were loosened.

He felt a hand, smaller than Georg’s, softer than Viper Lady’s, and warm, but he still kept his eyes closed, begging brokenly for death.

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since watching Mythbusters try this kind of torture, the Chinese Water Torture, I've been fascinated with the idea and have been trying to find a way to use it in one of my stories.  
> Nearing the end of this fic, just a few more weeks!


	16. The Rescue pt.1

Four Hours Earlier

X-Ray and Mogar stood side by side when their intruder finally awoke, groaning and struggling briefly to raise his arms before he realized they were held down to a chair in one of Hilda’s rooms. He raised his head with a scowl as he saw the two heroes before dropping his head again.

“Now, we can do this the easy way, or the Hilda way.” X-Ray started, getting the man’s attention as he snapped his head up again, a fierce glare directed at him before quickly changing to fix it at Mogar when the bear man growled lowly. “And between the three of us, I’d rather do things the easy way. You tell us what we want to know, and you get to go. To the police of course, for breaking into my home and trying to kidnap me.”

The man barked a laugh. “Fuck you.”

X-Ray sighed, more to keep his irritation in check than anything else, and kept his neutral face up. “Just tell us who sent you, and where Vav is.”

“If you’re fucking asking about the twink, you already know who sent me, assholes.” The man snapped, a twisting smirk on his lips that widened when Mogar’s growl grew louder, his hands in fists and his lips revealing bared teeth.

X-Ray put a hand on Mogar’s arm and the growling stopped almost instantly, as if his touch reassured him of… something. His teeth were still half-bared and fists tight by his sides, but he had stopped growling.

“Then tell us where the fuck our friend is.” The Puerto Rican demanded, glaring as intensely as he could to match the glare the man had in the chair.

The man just laughed and spat in their direction, almost causing Mogar to pounce on him again. The saliva was mixed with blood so X-Ray guessed Mogar had caused the man to either lose teeth or cut himself heavily on the inside of his mouth during the early dawn fight.

X-Ray sighed again, this time a staged sigh, as if he was genuinely sad for the answer given, before turning around, tapping Mogar’s arm so he did the same. “Fine, Hilda’s way it is. Have fun.”

They left the room where Hilda was waiting just outside with Orf. “He’s all yours.” X-Ray said with an exaggerated bow and gestured inside. The scientist and her robot went inside and the two heroes practically slumped against the wall, both feeling immensely fatigued.

They were so close to finally finding Vav and saving him, but who knew what could happen to him still. They still didn’t know what had happened to him, the video only left them with an idea, a small morsel of what had happened to their Brit.

The two waited with almost baited breath outside the room, unable to hear a thing as the room was soundproof. They weren’t sure what was happening, but they could only hope Hilda and Orf were getting information out of the asshole intruder.

Sure enough, almost an hour later, Hilda and the flying robot opened the door, the man quiet behind them as they left the room.

“Police will be coming to pick the douche up in half an hour.” Hilda said, a serious expression on her face.

“Were you…” X-Ray started, but at the look on Hilda’s face, something within him melted.

She had a soft smile that didn’t completely reach her eyes, which were stormy. “I had to use Orf to somewhat dig through his brain because he was a son of a bitch who tried mocking me three too many times, but yeah, I found the building Vav is being kept prisoner in. It’s a long drive, so I’ll explain on the way. Rusty should be here soon, right? He’s going to watch the douche and then watch the labs, hopefully deflecting my work until we return with Brit boy wonder.”

The two men nodded and followed Hilda to one of the company cars, Orf following behind before taking the passenger’s seat, making the heroes sit in the back together.

“It’s one of her mansion houses, along the outskirts of the city, and close to the Forest. There’s what looks like a smaller house next to the mansion, but it’s really the entrance to the basement we briefly saw in the video. The only problem was that he could be in a number of rooms. According to the asshole, he keeps being moved for different forms of torture.” Her voice wavered slightly at the word ‘torture’ and both heroes tensed visibly. Hilda cleared her throat before continuing. “So once we’re in, we have to look quick and find him fast.”

“The video’s audio suggested large room with many doors along the edge.” Orf piped in, no longer floating but rolling slightly in the passenger’s seat.

“So we split up when we get down there. Someone keep an eye on our escape, and the other two sweep the rooms until we either meet in the middle or find Vav.” X-Ray said, the others nodding in consent.

Two hours later

They finally reached the mansion in question, a large, impressive building that looked so innocent. X-Ray was surprised to see how ordinary and elegant the facade looked, not at all what he would expect of a villainous businesswoman.

They had decided on who would do what, agreeing that Hilda in her Orf suit would cover their escape while X-Ray would look along the right side of the room and Mogar on the left. They would give a signal if and when they found Vav, and the other would make their way to them to help get Vav out, providing backup until they met up with Hilda again to escape.

It wasn't the perfect plan, but it was the best they got at the moment, and they weren’t going to waste more time.

They quickly parked a ways away from the mansion’s gates, before carefully sneaking onto the property, Orf being used to keep off the radar. Hilda was already in the suit, looking even more badass then the last time they had seen the Orf suit. She must have upgraded it again.

The three made their way to the entrance without incident, but when they slipped inside and down the stairs, soon found themselves in a hornet’s nest.

With a roar, Mogar pulled his sword and charged, knocking enemies down as easily as paper, but not drawing blood or even killing them. X-Ray shot his newly upgraded glasses at various far enough away baddies before the three were able to hear the screaming.

It was awful, horrible sounds that felt like knives slicing into X-Ray’s heart over and over again. It sounded cracked and hoarse, desperate and pleading for something. They caused X-Ray’s heart to sink, while causing Mogar to roar in anger, running to where the screaming was coming from, a door close to the complete opposite side of the room. X-Ray took off after him.

The two fought their way through, knocking baddies out as fast as they could, until they reached the room as a new wave of screaming erupted from the room, begging for something.

“Please!” The scream cracked halfway, and it felt like ice piercing X-Ray’s heart. “Just stop! Please!”

“Vav!” Mogar shouted, reaching the door first and with all of his might, splintered the metal door like it was wooden, X-Ray just a few steps behind him.

The room inside was darker than the room he was in currently. He couldn’t see inside, quickly turning around to stop any who tried to stop Mogar, but he didn’t need to. All the baddies in the big room were unconscious or trying to fight off Hilda in her suit.

He jumped when a higher scream erupted from the room, and his heart stopped when he heard “Just kill me!”

He burst into the room to see the large man he recognized from the video and pictures as being Georg Frey, lying on the floor out cold, lacerations along his arms and his nose smashed. In the middle of the room was a table and Mogar was covering most of it from his view, but he saw the blue spandex and sprinted forward, trying to be deaf to the pleas for death coming from the Brit, who had his eyes shut tight and body thrashing weakly but wildly against Mogar’s gentle hold. X-Ray saw a little late the restraints that laid open around the table, as well as a weird contraption that he couldn’t tell what it did but didn’t look good, and wondered with scared eyes what had happened just before they got here.

“Just kill me, please! Stop it! Please! No more!” Vav’s voice was weaker than before, broken and X-Ray felt like his own heart snapped in two and he grabbed Vav’s face, ignoring the even brighter red pockmarks that littered his cheeks and neck like strangely raised sunburns, forcing at least his head to still, but his voice raised to a shriek of fear.

“Vav! Vav, it’s me, it’s us.” X-Ray brought his face close to Vav’s, just a few inches away, and with his hands holding Vav’s face, they weren’t going to move apart anytime soon. “We’re here. You’re safe now. You’re saved now. We’re gunna get you out of here.”

Vav seemed to have heard him, as his shrieks quieted down and he wasn’t thrashing as much, but he still wouldn’t open his eyes. X-Ray guessed that was as good as it was going to get, so he turned to Mogar and nodded to Vav. The bear man nodded and picked the Brit up, carefully and protectively, the slighter man looking impossibly young and small in his arms. Vav curled up to look even smaller in the bear man’s grip, wrapping his arms around the other’s neck and pressing his face into his chest and X-Ray’s face softened at the sight.

They found Vav, and now came the easy part.

Chapter done!


	17. The Rescue pt.2

Turns out it wasn’t as easy as X-Ray had first thought.

They made it out of the room that Vav had been held in fast enough, but as they were running to the entrance they found something was very wrong. Among the bodies of unconscious men and women that had been in the room or around the area when the fighting started, laid Hilda in her suit, in a somewhat rather uncomfortable position as if Orf had gone into a lockup mode as if badly damaged.

X-Ray ran to their scientist friend, kneeling next to her and calling her name.

“Hilda! Hilda, are you okay?” He called, looking for some sort of response when the faceplate brightened slightly and he heard Hilda’s voice.

“Watch out!”

X-Ray looked up in time to just barely narrowly miss the swipe made at him and he jumped away, hands rising up to his glasses in preparation to fight.

In front of him was the woman, Shesha Nayar, eyes flashing in anger as she reached behind her for something in her jeans, pulling out a gun.

“Do not even _think_ about moving.” She snarled in a tone that could rival Mogar’s, pointing the gun directly at X-Ray while looking behind him to where Mogar was, holding Vav protectively in his arms.

Mogar growled, a low rumbling that made Vav try to curl up closer to the warrior, and Shesha’s eyes locked onto the Brit.

She smirked, almost triumphantly. “This was even better than I thought. You may not have told us anything, but you practically delivered the wild boy right to us.” She said and Vav froze, stiffening in Mogar’s arms. X-Ray was about to turn to look at the two when Shesha raised her gun pointedly at his chest. “I said _don’t move._ ” She said.

X-Ray couldn’t look behind him to see Mogar or Vav, his hands halfway to his face, but it seemed Shesha was just begging to get trigger-happy, her finger twitching with every movement he made. He was careful to drop his hands, bringing them farther away from his gadgets despite wanting nothing more than to fire his laser at her. But he couldn’t risk Mogar, especially not Vav, getting hurt, or having to watch him get hurt.

Shesha smirked, a smug look that seemed to suit her, as she caught the glares from both Mogar and X-Ray, the bear man baring his teeth with a low growl, his arms tightening around Vav as if he could cover the thin – _God he hadn’t actually always been that thin, had he?_ – Brit with just his arms.

“Possessive, aren’t you?” She said, raising an eyebrow in amusement at the gesture. X-Ray really wanted to see what she was talking about but kept a constant eye on the barrel of the gun. “This is even better than I thought.”

“Whatever you think is going to happen, it isn’t going to go that way.” X-Ray said slowly, eyes trained on the gun but flicking to the villain’s face. “You can’t win this, Shesha.”

The woman laughed, a little surprised tinkling of chimes. “You think so, do you? And how do you suppose things will actually end, then, boy? You or the wild boy makes a single move, and you will have a bullet lodged in your chest.” She said in an amused tone, as if she wasn’t actually talking about mortally wounding or murdering the dark haired hero. “I think I can and will win this, boy.”

They heard a grunt come from behind them, and again X-Ray wanted to see, when he even twitched to look behind them, the businesswoman’s face hardened, and she actually shot close to him. X-Ray gasped as the bullet grazed his upper arm, cutting through the fabric and slicing through less than a millimeter of skin and his other hand went up to the graze, pulling away to see bright red stick to the dark grey of his gloves, his eyes wide.

Mogar had turned to see who had grunted to see the large bear-ish man, holding his nose as the smaller girl from the video supported him with a dark look directed at the bear man. But at the sound of the gunshot, he spun back around to see X-Ray grab his arm and the growling grew louder. He took a step forward but the woman cocked the gun back, aiming straight at the smaller hero’s chest. If Mogar had movable ears like a cat or dog, they would have been pressed flat against his head in anger and fear.

X-Ray narrowed his eyes, putting pressure on the wound to relieve the pain starting to sting. Shesha just smiled, looking between him and Mogar who was still behind him and out of his line of sight.

“Nah-ah-ah.” She shook her head very slowly as her eyes stayed on Mogar, the gun’s barrel at point blank range to X-Ray’s heart, her finger already slipping over the trigger to pull and X-Ray couldn’t think of any way out of this. They had been so close damn it!

“Now, I don’t think any of us want to dirty this lovely floor any more than it already has been.” The villain said and X-Ray nearly questioned her eyesight as the floor was dirty as hell, thinking that would let her have no restraint to pull that trigger. “Let us get going, we don’t have all day.”

Her gun flicked slightly away from X-Ray to tell him to start walking and he did, and he heard more footsteps behind him. Soon a procession was in effect, with X-Ray unwillingly leading the way with the gun’s muzzle pressed against the middle of his back, pushing him forward if he paused for a second, Mogar holding Vav behind them and whoever had joined them behind Mogar. They were heading towards a room on the right wall from the exit and X-Ray wondered what could be in it, although worried as well. They had been so close but now moving farther away! This was so fucking unfair!

Mogar wanted to grab for his sword oh so desperately, but he couldn’t, the smaller woman holding the large man had a smaller gun of her own, and even trying to discreetly adjust Vav in a one-armed hold resulting in the blue suit to squeak and squawk pitifully. He had to think carefully, planning an attack that would not harm his boys, his… What would he call them?

He quickly shook that train of thought free, returning to his plan of attack. He couldn’t reach his sword, but any warrior wouldn’t be stupid enough to only have one blade. He had a small hunting knife, made to have striking likeness to his diamond sword but smaller and lighter yet still as sharp, sheathed and hidden in his trousers. Mogar knew he still might have to adjust his hold on the Brit, but as he did, he made soothing coos as he pulled the small knife from its sheath, getting a single whine before Vav nuzzled his head closer to Mogar’s shoulder.

As they reached the door, Mogar waited until when he saw the gun leave X-Ray’s back to strike. As quick as he could, he closed the distance between him and Shesha, and with all his strength, plunged the knife into her back, relatively where the heart would be, feeling bones minutely resist. Shesha gave a high cry that seemed to startle the other workers in their procession.

Mogar heard a loud bang.

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kinda sorta flipped between Mogar and X-Ray's povs in this chapter, because X-Ray couldn't see everything that was going on, and because I was trying out Mogar's pov again.  
> I had a bit of trouble with writing the Rescue in general, because I wasn't sure what to do with Shesha. She was either going to get away, get put in jail, or the one I chose, which is her dying by Mogar's hand. It was also why I flipped between his and X-Ray's povs.  
> Place your bets now on who got shot!  
> Nearly over now. A few more chapters and an epilogue soon!


	18. Hospital

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Get ready for fluff. You, me, and Vav need it.

X-Ray wasn’t sure when he fell asleep, but he was only now waking up. His head was fuzzy and nonsensical, thoughts and images jumbling up like alphabet soup in his brain.

He didn’t want to open his eyes, feeling calm as his other senses took over feeling around the environment as he struggled to remember what he had done before falling asleep. His bed felt different, like it was thinner, and he could have sworn his clock didn’t beep that loud and that… That wasn’t counting down seconds, was it? He also realized he wasn’t sprawled on his stomach, or half on Mogar’s chest.

And was it his imagination or was the room much smaller than it should be? The room echoed the smallest of noises, and he was pretty damn sure his floor shouldn’t make sounds, it was carpet.

Struggling against the calm and peace that enveloped the blackness, X-Ray cracked an eye open, seeing warm white light assaulting him, and he gave a small grunt of discomfort.

Suddenly there was a lot of noise, and he felt his hand being squeezed and another hand cupping his cheek.

“X-R-Ray?” It sounded like…

X-Ray cracked his eye open again, blinking sleepily until he focused on the face very close to his own, noticing freckles and smudged red marks along the cheeks. His heart swelled, realizing Mogar had just said his name for the first time, not calling him ‘green suit’ or some other bullshit name, and his lips twitched upwards in an attempt to smile.

His eye wandered past Mogar’s face, trying to see where he was, but he didn’t have his glasses on, and everything just looked smudgy, like one of those charcoal drawings and an asshole touched it, ruining the image.

His attention was brought back to Mogar as he felt familiar soft, chapped lips briefly press themselves against his own, the feeling of relief and happiness conveyed in the kiss obvious, and it puzzled X-Ray. He couldn’t exactly remember where he was or why. The last thing he remembered was…

Oh! Both eyes snapped opened as a cry escaped him when he stiffened, pain bursting from around his body.

That’s right, he had been rescuing Vav from the businesswoman, and he remembered a cry and a loud noise before he felt pain blossom from his back. His lips twitched downwards this time, his breath turning worried, and Mogar could tell, the thumb on his face doing tiny circles to calm him, to reassure him.

“Wh-” X-Ray tried to speak, but his voice wouldn’t go above a breath, even as he tried to clear his throat. He wondered how much time had passed. “Va-av?” He finally managed.

Mogar looked to one side, and X-Ray tilted his head slowly in that direction, seeing a blob of blue that X-Ray knew anywhere, but there was just white where the emblem should be and X-Ray felt sad, not really knowing why but having a good guess why.

“Vav. He’s awake.” Mogar said, and Vav almost pushed the bear man out of the way to see X-Ray, leaning in close so X-Ray could see pretty clearly without his glasses.

“X-Ray, oh my god, mate.” Vav’s voice sounded strained, like he wasn’t sure if he should yell or whisper and was trying to do both at the same time. “You’re awake, you’re okay, bloody hell.”

“Course I’m okay…” X-Ray spoke slowly, his throat a little raspy and slurring words as his lips refused to move too much. “Why would I… not be?”

“You were bloody shot, you idiot! _Shot!_ ” The Brit repeated for emphasis, a hand reaching to cup X-Ray’s other cheek as Mogar refused to move his hand, and now X-Ray felt both of them rubbing circles into his cheeks with their thumbs and it was actually quite soothing. “In the back!”

“The healers told us many times you would take a while to wake up.” Mogar put in, his head blurred at the edges as he was still close to X-Ray’s line of sight but still far that he could no longer see the freckles that splashed on his face at all.

Slowly X-Ray put the rest of the pieces together, understanding the pain he felt now was around the same place as where he must have been shot. But he couldn’t understand how that happened. Why had he been shot? And where were they? Did they escape?

Before he could ask any of those questions, someone new and unfamiliar entered the room, and X-Ray guessed it was a nurse by the way she spoke, all professional and polite.

“I’m sorry, but visiting hours are closing now, sirs.” She interrupted them before they even spoke. “I know, he just woke up, but hospital rules. Come back in the morning, please. He’s not going anywhere.” That answered one question.

X-Ray watched, well felt mostly, he was pretty blind at the moment, Mogar stroke his cheek before stepping away, taking Vav’s hand with him as they walked out of the room.

“They’ve been worried sick about you.” The nurse commented as she went around the room, probably checking the machines that were hooked up to him and he heard pen moving on paper. “I’ve been barely able to check on you quickly without them stopping me to demand to know when you’d wake up, to know if you were getting better or worse. As if one worried boyfriend wasn’t enough.” She gave a warm giggle at the warmth that coloured X-Ray’s face.

“We aren’t…” X-Ray defended, but he trailed off as he wasn’t too sure. He couldn’t tell: Mogar had just kissed him, and Vav, well… Vav seemed like he wanted to but didn’t. He decided to continue blushing instead.

“Its fine, its fine, I can’t really judge, myself.” The nurse smiled as she checked over X-Ray himself. “You’re pretty lucky to have two caring partners. Most people can’t even find one.”

She stood back, her tone professional again. “Okay, so you seem to be doing much better than when you arrived here. Do you remember what happened?”

“A… A bit.” X-Ray answered, his voice still raspy after clearing his throat.

“Oh, need something to drink?” The nurse reached to X-Ray’s side and suddenly a plastic cup with a straw appeared in his face and after a couple attempts he managed to capture the straw and took a few glorious sips of water. He released the straw when he was finished, mumbling a quiet thank you to the woman.

“That’s good, in any case. We’ve had people who can’t remember a thing, which is always hard for us to care for them properly because we might miss something vital. We know you have that gunshot wound on the lower part of your back, and luckily it was a clean shot that missed all the vital organs and whatnot. And then the graze close to your bicep. Are there any other injuries you might have?” She asked, clipboard and pen ready.

X-Ray took a mental inventory before shaking his head slightly. “Nope. Nothing major anyway. Just feel like shit, to be honest.”

The nurse giggled. “That’s understandable. I’m going to up the happy juice, the morphine, for you, okay? It should also help you get some better sleep tonight.” She went over some more rules: where to find the ‘call nurse’ button; he couldn’t get out of bed until at least morning when she would be back to help him move around, so if he needed to piss, there was a pisspot/chamber-pot. The last one made him red for a whole other reason but the nurse just laughed goodnaturedly. “I will see you in the morning, sir.”

“Call me… X-Ray.” The Puerto Rican hero mumbled as she had added more morphine into his system and he already felt less pain.

“X-Ray? Okay. Then call me Megan.” She said as X-Ray’s eyes fluttered, obviously trying to stay awake to listen but losing rather quickly. “Good night, X-Ray.”

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Noo, I totally didn't make Meg a nurse because I wanted to, what would give you that idea? *innocent whistling*


	19. Bandages

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *bangs fists on table* MOVAV FLUFF

Vav was actually surprised when he found himself back in his apartment he shared with X-Ray, but with Mogar in the lead and… heading for X-Ray’s room?

“Mogar what are you doing?” He called from the hallway, as he had been about to head for his own room, excited beyond belief that he was actually back, he was safe, Mogar was safe, _X-Ray_ was okay, and he was actually back with them.

Mogar paused by X-Ray’s door, looking back at Vav with a slight tilt of his head as if confused by the question. “Going to sleep?” He answered in a question of his own, like it was the most obvious answer in the world.

“In X-Ray’s room?” Vav continued, trying to show Mogar the flaw in his thoughts.

Mogar still had his head tilted before he took a step back, away from X-Ray’s room. Vav took a breath as he thought Mogar understood but then the bear man simply went to Vav’s room. He had already taken off his pelt, his arm bands and boots, his marks smudging off that a towel or tissue wouldn’t fix the rest, his sword lying on his pelt and his smaller version apparently still on his person since Vav couldn’t see it in the pile.

Vav spluttered as he reached his room, finding Mogar climbing into bed, keeping to one side of the bed, and wrapping the blanket around his shoulders, somewhat sitting with his back to the headboard and Vav just stood there unable to form words. It was rare for the warrior to stay over, and when he did, he normally took the pull out bed that doubled as the couch, and yet, now he had tried to sleep in X-Ray’s room and right in front of him the warrior was almost _waiting_ for Vav, leaving the British hero to stand at the door, looking unsure.

Mogar looked up at Vav after the Brit didn’t move for about a minute, looking confused. “Are you coming to sleep or not?” He sounded hesitant, nervous. About what, Vav had no idea, but his heart stumbled over its next couple beats and a huge wave of pure affection surged through him. He almost went right to the bed and curl up next to Mogar, but he knew he should change, his bloody and chestless suit really had to go.

He grabbed his pajamas, and quickly left to change in the bathroom, looking at himself from the mirror with a frown. The large cut-out ended around about a palm’s length from his navel, covering most of his chest that made it hurt to bend much. His entire torso was wrapped in bandages and ointment and other stuff to make the skin heal and get rid of any infection that could have occurred since the wounds were made. His arm was in something like a cast, mostly just thicker bandages around the stab wound near his elbow.

Letting his eyes slowly travel up his body, he saw various bandages littering his jaw, little bandaids over the small wounds made by Viper Lady (Hilda finally told him her real name when they had finally escaped, and he was surprised by the name, Shesha). The burns couldn’t really be bandaged or anything, but he was told to put cool ( _not cold_ , the doctor was adamant about that) things over the burns for a small amount of time every couple hours or so, or whenever they hurt more than usual. He winced at the burns on his cheeks, they mostly hurt whenever he tried talking, or yawning as he had been for the better part of their time in the hospital, both when he was getting checked over and then waiting for X-Ray to wake up.

Vav jumped when he suddenly saw Mogar standing behind him in the mirror, and twisted around to see he was actually there, a concerned look on his face as he searched for something on Vav’s face. He raised a hand to Vav’s face, and Vav flinched when fingers lightly brushed his cheek, the cheek Viper-Shesha seemed to love to backhand. There was a huge hand-shaped bruise already forming, and sensitive to the touch, even along the edges of the bruise.

Mogar’s hand retreated like he had been burned, an alarmed and worried expression enveloping his face before something like guilt surfaced and Vav immediately grabbed the hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze.

“Sorry, sorry, it still… It still hurts, that’s all.” He said, and Mogar’s guilt disappeared, leaving the worried expression as his other hand reached to carefully, as if he were holding something fragile, cup Vav’s other cheek, the same way he, and Vav himself now that he realized it, had done to X-Ray when he had woken up in the hospital.

“Mogar is sorry you got hurt… Because of Mogar, everything…” Mogar’s voice was strained, his expression turning pained.

Vav squeezed the hand he still held again. “But you saved me. You and X-Ray, and Miss Hilda too! You found me and saved me, and stopped her.”

Mogar looked straight into Vav’s eyes, the guilt resurfaced there along with hope and Vav dropped holding his hand to cup his cheek with his mostly uninjured hand.

“You three saved me, and I cannot give my thanks enough.” Vav said in a quiet voice, not having to speak loudly at how close they were to one another.

Mogar took another few seconds, searching Vav’s face, his eyes, for something before he leant in all the way and gave the Brit a chaste, brief kiss, actually almost identical to the kiss he had given X-Ray when he had woken up. Vav quickly leant into the kiss when the bear man moved to break the kiss, the hand cupping his cheek frantically trying to hold him still, stop him from moving. Luckily he didn’t need to, as soon as Mogar noticed the reciprocation to the kiss, he returned, soft and careful, not wanting to hurt him anymore than he already was hurt. His other hand, now free of being held by Vav’s hand, was placed firmly but softly on Vav’s hip, and he tilted his head to deepen the kiss ever so slightly.

Soon the two broke apart to breathe and Vav had a sideways grin forming, a huff of laughter escaping him as he felt lighter, happier, _better_ after the kiss, and looking at Mogar, he knew the other felt the same, even if neither knew how to explain how they felt.

Vav took a step back, his smile still in place. “I think I’m going to change now, so if you don’t mind?”

Mogar practically jumped and nodded quickly, turning but not before Vav saw pink staining his cheeks, causing Vav to give another huff of laughter before the door closed and he was able to finally, finally, _finally_ get out of the bloodstained suit and into something looser and much more comfortable. It took a bit longer to struggle out of the suit, with his injuries making everything stupid difficult, but he managed. Once he had gotten his arms out and his torso, he only needed to wiggle out his legs, the only parts of his body that hadn’t been damaged besides bruises and faint cuts that had already healed, and he quickly changed into his sleepwear, giving a sigh of relief at the looseness that didn’t irritate his finally healing injuries.

He stopped for another few moments to look at the suit now crumpled on the floor, dried blood flaking off in small patches and spots of blue now practically dyed purple. He couldn’t exactly keep, nor did he really want to keep this suit. The memories brought up by it would haunt him even without the article of clothing. He folded it up for now, putting it on the counter to deal with later.

Vav returned to his room to find Mogar relatively in the same position as before, on one side of his bed, the blanket wrapped around his shoulders like a hooded cloak. Vav approached, unsure what to do until Mogar lifted a hand and part of the blanket, offering a spot right next to him. He crawled next to him, feeling warm almost instantly as the blanket encompassed the two, and Mogar quickly pulled him close until he was leaning onto the bear man’s chest, which was soft and squishy, something he had only distantly, idly thought when he had been saved.

Vav couldn’t remember too much of the rescue, only the warmth of Mogar holding him, pain creating stars burst behind his eyes before he actually blacked out, only waking up with Hilda out of her Orf suit, looking down at him with concern, before he passed out again, knowing somewhere in his head that he was safe, that he could actually rest and escape for more than a couple tense hours. He had then woken up at the hospital, with a doctor and a couple nurses working on him with precise hands and expert care, adjusting themselves and the bandages when Vav made noises of complaint and discomfort. Mogar had come to see him soon after that, before he was discharged from the hospital, to tell him what happened to X-Ray and he had been out most of the day.

Vav looked up and over to Mogar, feeling warm and oh so safe almost hidden under the blankets with Mogar as his squishy pillow, and he quickly nuzzled closer, seeking the warmth and safety the bear man seemed to give off, a hand wrapping around the other’s waist, and fell asleep very quickly.

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nineteen chapters and Vav finally learns the name of his kidnapper. I think he'd keep referring her as Viper Lady, tbh.  
> Also, can you tell I love having Mogar's chest not be rock hard? Because I love squishy tough bear man Mogar.  
> So now we've seen X-Ray and Mogar kiss, and Vav and Mogar kiss... *schemes more* I need more fluff before this ends.  
> Next week is the final chapter and epilogue, look forward to them~


	20. Becoming Something More

X-Ray had to stay in the hospital for another week so his doctor and nurse could make sure the bullet wound would heal properly. He was fine with it, as Vav and Mogar would visit him almost the entire time they were allowed to each day, with well wishes and warm touches that grew more intimate with each day, but X-Ray felt like he was missing something even with the two sitting in the hospital room, talking about nothing, or hiding from Hilda when she visited as they were supposed to be patrolling ( _But we can’t when he's in the hospital! It needs to be the three of us again!_ Vav had argued once or twice when Hilda first found them shooting the shit the third day of X-Ray’s hospitalization) but for the life of him, he couldn’t figure it out.

His nurse was actually a great help with understanding the feeling. Megan was very easy to talk to, maybe because of her job, and when the other heroes were kicked out at the end of visiting hours, he and she would spend a few minutes every hour talking while she went on her circuit of checking her various patients.

“So, I hope I’m not being rude in asking, but after everything, are you three together?” Megan asked on his last overnight stay as the Puerto Rican was settling into the bed again, but at the question he paused.

“Uhh, well.” He started, scratching his head. “We haven’t really talked about it. Before all the shit hit the fan, we didn’t really think that way about each other, at least I don’t think I did, but then…” His head swayed from side to side as he bit his lip. “And then when things happened, Vav was missing from the picture. Now, we just haven’t talked about it.”

“Do you want to talk to them about getting together, formally?” She asked, sitting on the chair that was normally occupied by Vav. X-Ray nodded after a second of thought and his nurse smiled. “You’ll know when’s the perfect time to talk about it, X-Ray. But take it from me, talk to them not in public. Maybe when you’re all home.”

X-Ray nodded. He had already thought of that, which was one of the reasons he never brought it up for the past week, despite feeling like he should. Megan reached out and patted his shoulder, before saying she’d see him in the morning.

Finally it was the last day and he would be discharged as soon as he finished signing the forms and shit and Vav and Mogar were already there, practically bright-eyed and bushy tailed as they got to the room just after Megan handed X-Ray the forms and a pen.

“All the things you need to sign or initial are highlighted. Sorry for the stack.” She said with an amused smile as she turned to see Vav practically vibrating and, despite Mogar’s best attempts, the bear man standing beside him looking really hopeful, and both nurse and patient saw the intertwined fingers that the others didn’t seem to have noticed they were doing.

X-Ray had always thought Vav had fallen hard for Mogar, from the moment they met, which might have explained some of the jealousness he had felt towards the bear man in the beginning. Looking in hindsight, so many things about the way he acted with Vav for years, and then with Mogar a lot more recently, should have tipped X-Ray off to the fact he felt so much affection towards the two men he proudly called friends. He wondered if he would soon get the chance to proudly call them…

“X-Ray! Are you finished with all that yet?” Vav’s voice startled X-Ray back to the present and he quickly flushed, looking down at the papers, and no, he was not even nearly finished. God there were a lot of highlights to sign.

“What? Oh, no, not yet. You can sit while I do this.” He said, gesturing with the pen to the chairs.

To say he was surprised when Vav sat in Mogar’s lap when the other sat in the closest chair would be an understatement and he put down his pen with a curious look.

“Did I miss something between last night and now?” He asked, looking between the two as he saw Megan discreetly leave and close the door behind her, leaving them alone for now.

“Hmm?” Vav looked confused before jolting up as Mogar reminded him where he was sitting. “Oh! Uh, well… Uhh.”

Vav turned to Mogar, who sighed, wrapping his arms around the slighter man (X-Ray was happy to see him regain his original shape, although the beginnings of dark circles under his eyes were worrisome), clasping his hands and resting them on his lap. “Mogar and Vav have been talking about…” He looked uncertain, looking at Vav for confirmation. “Mates?”

X-Ray’s eyebrows shot up, inwardly relieved he hadn’t been the only one thinking about it, but the words also drew heat to his cheeks, colouring them pink. “Mates?”

“Yes. You, Mogar and I. Mogar told me of the nights you two spent together, and it got me thinking.” Vav said, his own hands overlapping Mogar’s. “If you’re also okay with it-”

“Of fucking course. You don’t even need to ask.” X-Ray sat up straighter, his body no longer sending waves of pain whenever he moved his torso, and he smiled widely. “I was actually worried I was going to have to start this conversation.”

Vav’s eyes widened and brightened tremendously and he bounced a bit in Mogar’s lap. “Really? Oh thank god, I was so worried you wouldn’t want to and then everything was going to be super awkward and-”

Mogar put a hand over Vav’s mouth, pulling him close so he could rest his chin on the Brit’s shoulder. “Please. Quiet.”

X-Ray chuckled, his grin never leaving his face as he finished signing the forms, and when Megan saw the grin, gave a knowing smirk of her own to the three, leaving two of them looking confused and the third looking grateful. The smile continued as he was wheeled out (hospital rules, not that X-Ray really had anything to complain about as Mogar pushed the wheelchair and Vav held his hand the entire way) and was brought into one of Monarch Labs’s company vans, with Rusty in the driver’s seat, smiling and waving from inside the van.

“Hey man, glad to see you’re better now. Vav told me to drop you three at your place, right?” He asked, looking between the three, noticing the intertwined fingers but not saying a word. Vav nodded and they were soon on their way, X-Ray sitting between Vav and Mogar in the back and holding hands with both, Vav’s thumb running soothingly over his knuckles while the bear man just squeezed the digits gently every so often.

X-Ray was never happier to see his apartment complex approaching then the moment Rusty parked by the entrance, looking back to the three heroes. “Need help getting out?”

“Nah, we’ll be fine.” Vav waved his free hand, a smile on his face and the three heroes got out of the van and said goodbye to the man, trying (and ultimately failing) to ignore his chuckling comment of ‘Use protection boys!’ as he sped away, leaving one bear man confused as the other two blushed furiously, looking anywhere but at the other.

Maybe it was all the excitement of the morning, but X-Ray felt tired by the time they reached the apartment, excusing himself to collapse on his bed, mindful of his still healing wound. Just because he was discharged didn’t mean he was completely and fully healed, and so he found himself laying on his stomach, falling to sleep, barely noticing when large hands pulled him close, and a thinner arm draping itself over his back, then his side as the hands moved him sideways, feeling warmth on either side.

X-Ray couldn’t seem to get rid of that grin, even as he slipped into dreams.

Chapter done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So much fluff.  
> This chapter was originally gunna start differently, but I found it was too unnatural for the characters, so I used Megan to make it much more natural.  
> Also, I just realized how weird it is that, although I'm the tiniest bit afraid of hospitals, I have written them many times.


	21. Epilogue

Three Months Later

Vav woke up to sunlight streaming into his face, making him squint as he cracked an eye open. He reached forward, hoping to use one of his boyfriends as a way to block the sun, but felt nothing, suddenly feeling cold even under the blanket, even though it was late summer.

Turning and lifting his head from the pillow, he opened his eyes again to see where the two had gone off to, mentally shaking himself so his senses would work properly. Ever since the kidnapping, his senses took a couple seconds longer than normal to wake up, with his sense of touch taking the longest, his touch and sight sometimes sending conflicting signals to his brain that took a while to sort out. It has yet to affect his hero business, as by the time he dons the suit (now woven with ultra-light, ultra-effective metal that won’t rip unless under extreme conditions) his mind has sorted out everything and he’s able to go about his day, most of his scars completely healed and hidden.

The marks and burns on his face were another story. They couldn’t be healed any more than to stop the pain, and unless he wore a scarf, couldn’t be hidden from sight. He didn’t like the stares of the citizens whenever he was out and about, but it was getting better. They no longer stared as long, sometimes didn’t even react to the burns, much to Vav’s relief.

Vav scanned the bedroom, not finding anything, but finally hearing the faint sound of the TV, and the loud noise of water running, making Vav guess one was either in the shower or using the dishwasher.

He sat up slowly, stretching with a yawn. He couldn’t go too quickly, he had learned this soon after being rescued. His body still felt like it was in that basement, with the Burly Georg, or the French Girl, or Viper Lady, being subjected to the various abuse, like this right here was a fantasy. So he went about waking up slowly, mindful of how close he always was to snapping into a full blown attack.

It had been difficult, the first month. Vav would wake up screaming, or trying to tear the flesh of his arms off, or crying out for it to stop, that it hurts, to just kill him already. X-Ray and Mogar would try their best, Mogar helping the most as his presence alone, his warm chest, his rumbling as he spoke, reminded him that he was safe, he wasn’t trapped anymore. X-Ray helped in his own way, curling around Vav, combing his hair, and talking about some game or movie they’d want to see or play. His way didn’t always work, but Vav loved his attempts no matter what.

He loved X-Ray and Mogar so much it almost hurt.

He was brought back to the present when the door connecting the bedroom to the bathroom opened and X-Ray appeared, wrapped in a towel around the waist, his healed bullet wound clearly visible, and he smiled at Vav, even without his glasses.

“Morning, babe.” He greeted, heading for the closet. It was their first day off in a while, although they were able to be called in if there was a dire situation (God Vav hoped there wouldn’t be). X-Ray paused by the bed on his way to the closet to lean close to Vav and peck his cheek, scrunching his nose as he missed, took hold of Vav’s chin gently, and succeeded in pecking his lips. “Sorry we didn’t wake you. But you looked so peaceful even Mogie said he would have felt guilty waking you.”

“Mmm, morning. ‘Sfine.” Vav mumbled through a sleepy smile. “Better to get as much sleep as I can, anyway.” He shrugged, noting the faint frown that disappeared as soon as it had appeared on X-Ray’s face.

“Yeah, guess that’s true. How are you feeling, anyhow?” X-Ray asked, letting go of Vav’s chin as he headed to find something to wear, pulling out a bright purple hoodie (why he would choose a hoodie in late summer was a mystery to Vav, but he wouldn’t ask) and some boxers and shorts. He changed quickly, they had never been in that phase in their relationship (including their friendship) where they would be nervous or uncomfortable stripping in front of the other. Hell, Vav saw X-Ray’s dick when they first met as kids!

Vav shrugged, his senses finally back to working properly as he swung his legs over the edge of the bed. “Good, I guess. No nightmares, that’s an improvement, uh?”

X-Ray brightened at the news. “That’s great! How long it’s been now? A full week without nightmares?” He guessed and after a moment to think, Vav nodded. “That’s really great, Vav!”

Vav smiled, standing and shuffling over to X-Ray to nuzzle against the man, not minding the still wet hair. He was just as happy as his boyfriend with his improvement, no matter how small it might be, or how slow the improvements were. Slow improvements were better than no improvement, or getting worse, in his opinion, and X-Ray and Mogar agreed with him.

X-Ray tugged Vav gently to get his attention again. That wasn’t one of the good things, since ever since he had been rescued, Vav found himself going off into his own head very quickly, even when they were out on duty. He wasn’t sure what caused him to zone out, but his boyfriends were patient with him.

Man he loved them so much.

X-Ray took his hand with his own, twining their hands together and walking them out of the bedroom, leading the way to the living room where they found Mogar lounging on the couch, obviously clueless to what was going on in the cartoon show he was currently watching, his eyes glazed and a confused frown on his lips. He snapped to when he saw Vav and X-Ray approach him and he smiled warmly, his smiles had always been infectious as Vav felt himself smile back.

“Good morning.” He greeted, sitting up to let Vav sit beside him, pulling X-Ray with him when he was about to go get his glasses.

The smaller dropped surprised into Vav and Mogar’s laps with a yelp before apparently taking it in stride, stretching out to hold the two down on the couch with a laugh.

Vav laughed with him, his face stretching with the grin on his face, as Mogar leant over X-Ray to kiss him quickly before pulling away with a chuckle of his own.

They went about their day off lounging about, X-Ray and Vav from time to time teaching Mogar more grammar (well, really it was Vav trying to do that, X-Ray was trying to teach him outdated slang. Though, it was hilarious seeing Mogar call Miss Hilda ‘dawg’ and ‘homie’ a couple weeks ago, he couldn’t lie about that) with the reward of kisses before the attempts devolved into just short make-out sessions.

It was about mid-afternoon when the special phone rang, and X-Ray, having been caught about to kiss Mogar’s cheek as they watched another show, groaned loudly but got up to answer it.

“Hello, this is the X-Ray and Vav, and Mogar,” He added after a beat at the look the bear man gave him, “hotline. Why are you calling on our day off?”

Vav looked curiously at X-Ray as he listened to the phone, sighing and dropping his head onto the back of the couch.

X-Ray sighed, nodding before hanging up with an affirmative, turning to his boyfriends with an already tired look. “Mad King escaped again. We have to find him ASAP.” He told them as he headed for the bedroom to get his suit.

Vav and Mogar looked between each other before they sighed as well. The rest was nice while it lasted. Vav headed for the bedroom to fetch his suit while Mogar went to the bathroom for his paint. Since they had started calling each other boyfriends and mates he had changed his markings, adding thicker lines and dots, some lines looking like small Vs while others crisscrossed like Xs. The bear man had tried to explain the reasoning to the two but both couldn’t understand, but were flattered in any case.

They were ready in less than ten minutes, looking between each other by the front door. They were still trying to keep their relationship a secret to the city (it wasn’t a secret to the city, they were terrible at keeping it hush hush, but most of the city found the heroes dating was quite cute and Hilda had come up with the name X-Movav when she had found out, after she finished gushing about how cute they were, of course) so they pecked each other’s lips before stepping out to find the Mad King and stop whatever plans he had this time.

Just another day for Vav and his boyfriends, really.

Story Done!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And this is the end of Am I a Hero. I hope you all enjoyed the journey, I sure did!  
> Tell me what you liked, what you disliked, what I could do to improve, and also any questions you may have(this could be scenes, characters, relations, etc)  
> As for my other fics, Team Super Lads will be coming around this time Monday, and I've decided to update that every other week. The same will go with His Mad Game which will be coming on Wednesday. Look forward to those next week!


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